[Project for Self-Help Tableware Involving Local Traditional Arts and Crafts of Japan]

To improve the quality ofmeals in communities, "Keiji study group on dysphagia" was founded in 2010. With the "Project for Self-Help Tableware involving Traditional Arts and Crafts," we will introduce an innovative community collaboration of cultural specialists,. The existing self-help tableware are not suitable for traditional feasts. Therefore, to produce new self-help tableware, we collaborated with cooks, designers, potters, and a lacquer ware company. To ensure a comfortable traditional feast, the backgrounds and cultural manners ofeach ofthese specialists were integrated. Finally, traditional Japanese style tableware was produced through repeated trial manufacturing. We offered patients with eating disorders a Japanese style feast that ameliorates swallowing and we had them use the produced tableware. The observers, the patients, and patients' families approved of the tableware because it increased their appetite and they developed a positive attitude toward eating. In the future, the need for food that ameliorates swallowing will increase. This new eating culture is not only concerned with the production off ood, but also with the presentation ofits tableware. We are planning to support the development ofsuch a cuisine through a sponsored project, which will encourage collaboration between local manufacturing of traditional culture and occupational therapy.