Yes, fill out your form here, and we will let you know if we can direct bill your appointment.

• Manitoba Blue Cross 
• Canada Life
• Chambers of Commerce
• Maximum Benefits
• Claim Secure
• Green Shield Canada
• Medavie Blue Cross
• SSQ

Clients are responsible for knowing their coverage details, understanding their benefits, and keeping track of their usage from their insurance company. 

Before your visit, please call your insurance company and ask:

• For nutrition help: Is registered dietitian for nutrition counseling covered? 
• For therapy or counselling help: Are registered social workers covered for counseling/therapy?
• Do I need a physician referral or prior authorization? (usually for Blue Cross & Claim Secure)
• What is the yearly plan coverage amount?
• Is there a co-pay amount (Ex. They pay 80% you pay 20%)
• Do I have a deductible to meet before insurance pays?

Insurance company phone numbers:

• Manitoba Blue Cross: 204-775-0151
• Canada Life: 1-800-957-9777
• Green Shield/SSQ: 1-888-711-1119
• Chambers: 1-800-665-3365
• Maximum Benefit: 1-800-893-7587
• Claim Secure: 1-888-513-4464
• Medavie (National Blue Cross): 1-888-873-9200  OR 204-775-9261    
• Sirius Benefits: (204) 488-7600
• Peoples Corp: (204) 940-3900

***Manitoba Blue Cross: Requires a medical illness or health condition to be present for coverage (even if your plan doesn’t require a referral).

These insurance companies have dietitian/therapy coverage, but do not allow for direct billing: Sunlife, Manulife, DesJardins and Equitable Life.

Finding out these details will help ensure you get the most out of your health insurance benefits and avoid financial surprises!

No, you can self-refer. However, your insurance company may require a physicians referral to use your health benefits. ***If you have Manitoba Blue Cross, then your insurance requires a medical illness or health condition to be present for coverage. 

If your insurance company requires a referral for coverage, we require this in advance to your appointment to make sure we can direct bill for you. If you have obtained a referral, you can email it to our office at admin@alittlenutrition.com. We will review it and make sure it satisfies insurance requirements. If you do not have a referral, and your insurance company requires one, you can easily obtain one at either of these Walmart Medical Walk-In Clinics: Taylor, Kenaston or Lakewood.  Doctors or medical clinics can fax your referral directly to us at 1-204-515-7479.

Most of our clients report seeing remarkable changes in their eating and health after 3 to 5 appointments spaced out over 3 to 6 months. However, some clients require appointments every 2 weeks until they can get the hang of their new pattern of eating and to work through the challenges they are facing. Some clients only need 1 or 2 appointments. Your dietitian or therapist will give you a recommended treatment plan at your initial appointment.

***If you are working on healing your relationship with food or recovering from an eating disorder treatment length time will vary and usually requires more frequent appointment times. 

Yes and no. It will depend on your nutrition or health concern.

• If you are struggling with an eating disorder or your relationship with food, we may work with you to develop a mechanical meal plan to help stabilize your eating and health. The goal would be to move away from this and learn to eat intuitively when indicated. 
• For others, we will help you learn the necessary skills to make an individual or family meal plan and provide assistance to you each step of the way. We believe teaching you “how” to nourish yourself is far better than handing you a meal plan that you will likely only be able to follow for a few weeks. We help you learn the skills of meal planning, meal prep, grocery shopping and preparing simple meals that you enjoy.
• Still want a meal plan? If you subscribe to our email list, we send out meal plans for recipe inspiration on a regular basis, but these are intended to help our clients stay excited about eating well (and is not a rigid meal plan).

Dietitians don’t have access to ordering lab work in Canada. If you are looking to find out about food sensitivities we do not recommend the one from naturopaths (IgG tests) as they are only 50% accurate and leave many people more confused about what to eat than before the test. Alternatively, if you are having GI issues, we would recommend getting the blood screening test for celiac by your family doctor.

We work with clients to find out their food sensitivities by doing a nutrition assessment and detective work based on their symptoms. We have a variety of approaches to help you with symptom management and would help you put together an eating plan that would aim to reduce symptoms and suit your lifestyle and food preferences.

We are here to support you with your weight and body concerns. However, to be fully transparent, we cannot guarantee weight loss because your weight is not a behaviour. Weight loss may be an OUTCOME of behaviour and can be based on how one nourishes their body, lifestyle, genetics, activity level, hormones, DNA, previous dieting history and relationship with food. 

We know that HEALTH is not solely determined by ones weight. We believe a persons healthy weight is achieved by creating a balanced relationship with food, joyful movement and rest. When we care for our bodies through balanced nutrition, movement and rest, our weight will naturally settle at is most comfortable weight range. This range has been determined by our DNA – our heredity, or our “natural weight”. 

We provide an alternative to restrictive dieting by offering weight neutral care. That means we help clients move on from focusing on the number on the scale to what actually matters. That might be lowering your blood pressure, having more energy to get around, or just feeling good about how you are nourishing yourself and/ or family. We can choose to appreciate the body we are living in, adopt good health habits and let our weight fall where it will naturally.

All THE REASONS WHY WE DON’T WEIGHT CLIENTS – You are so much more than a number!

• Seriously, who likes to be weighed? The act of being weighed creates a lot of anxiety with most folks, and doesn’t initiate a positive relationship with your dietitian? Being weighed can contribute to feelings of low self worth.

• Most people who have ever been on a diet, done a wellness program, or participated in a commercial weight loss program can tell you that their experience with the scale is traumatizing.

• The number on the scale doesn’t reflect your health or the hard work you put into being a healthier person.

• Anticipated “weigh ins” can loom heavy on folks minds prior to a appointment.

• Nothing ruins a nutrition session faster than being weighed and the number not being what one may hope for or expect. Folks may have worked really hard at shifting their health habits, meal planning, eating out less, and moving more. However, the number on the scale can make one feel like a failure if it isn’t what was expected.

• Weighing yourself frequently can contribute to an unhealthy relationship with food and your body, create stress, and isn’t even that accurate.

• The number on the scale is external data or cue. We know that focusing on external cues are barriers to getting back in touch with internal cues, like hunger/fullness, how food makes you feel, and satisfaction.