Welcome to
Solid Starts PRO!

Find resources for healthcare professionals, including primary care providers, feeding therapists, dietitians, nutritionists, and students.

Take a course to earn CEUs and grow your competence in infant feeding, or become a member of our PRO community and get access to exclusive lectures, events, clinical tools, discounts, and a spot on our directory so that parents around the world can find you and your services.
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Write your awesome label here.

About Solid Starts PRO
Membership

Become a member and get access to a growing collection of evidence-based resources and ready-to-use tools designed to make your work easier.

Students and parents can also become members to access the course and dive deeper into pediatric feeding.

Pro Membership Includes

Access to PRO Foundations course (eligible for 1.5 continuing education contact hours)

Exclusive invites to monthly lecture series on current pediatric feeding topics also eligible for CEUs

Live events are led by our team of experts, including MDs, OTs, SLPs, IBCLCs and RDs

Downloadables to support your practice, include dot phrases, sample AVS language, evaluation templates and more

Access to digital Solid Starts badge which can be used on your website to identify that you are a Solid Starts member

PRO directory listing for licensed members who pass our Foundations quiz puts your practice in front of over a million parent visitors every month

Pro Courses

Members have the opportunity to be listed on our public facing professionals directory, visible to the 1 million+ families that visit our website each month.

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"Truly the best course I have taken recently! I found all the presenters to be extremely easy to listen to and learn from. Very engaging and informative!"

- Elaina Verrette

CBS, CLC

"As a subspecialist, a lot of my patients have dietary restrictions due to renal failure or dysfunction; however processed baby food is much more difficult to use due to other ingredients being in them so we often advocate for making their own purees (if tube fed) or trying other foods. I think that this course has further strengthened me to advocate for this."

- Amanda Uber

DO

"I highly recommend the foundations course to any practitioner who would like to develop or refine their knowledge in solid food introduction for infants. There is more useful information in this 90 minute course than in many full day courses I have taken. Every bit of information is clearly taught and useful. The instructors are experts in the field, engaging and left me feeling confident that I understood the material present and could use what I learned in my own practice."

- Jen Rivera

OTD, OTR/L, SWC
Free Webinar

Not sur where to start?

Gain free access to a Food Allergy Reactions Webinar!
Course instructors

Meet our Team

Led by award-winning pediatric feeding & swallowing specialists, this course covers a range of topics from reflexes and cranial nerves to the complex interplay of oral motor skills, and environmental factors that influence choking risk.
Jenny Best
Founder + CEO
Jenny is a mom of three on a quest to help families find joy at the table. Passionate about food and farming, Jenny founded Solid Starts to make it easier for parents to learn how to introduce any food to their baby. Jenny is the creator of the award-winning First Foods® database, which anyone can access for free in the Solid Starts App.
Kim Grenawitzke
Senior Feeding + Swallowing Specialist (OTD, OTR/L, SCFES, IBCLC, CNT)
Specializing in infant and child feeding, eating, and swallowing, Kim has spent the majority of her career in pediatric acute care at some of the largest children's hospitals on the west coast, focusing specifically on neonatal (NICU) feeding and swallowing, breastfeeding with high-risk infants, and infant/pediatric cardiac rehabilitation. In addition to her hospital-based work, Kim has worked with families struggling with breastfeeding, transitioning to solids, selective/picky eating, tube weaning, and oral motor/chewing. Kim is a mom of two in Michigan.
Kary Rappaport
Senior Feeding + Swallowing Specialist (OTR/L, MS, SCFES, IBCLC)
A mom of two, Kary specializes in family mealtime dynamics and eating issues across the spectrum, from breast and bottle feeding challenges and picky eating, to dysphagia, tube feeding, and complex food refusal. Kary has extensive, wide-ranging work experience from outpatient therapy, to pediatric acute care in a high acuity NICU, to in-home settings and Well Child visits, all supporting families and children with eating and swallowing. Kary has worked with thousands of infants and children as they learn to eat, and she has taught parents and medical professionals on this topic for nearly two decades.
Venus Kalami
Pediatric Dietitian + Nutritionist (MNSP, RD, CSP)
Inspired by her mother’s work serving nutritionally vulnerable mothers and infants, Venus is dedicated to bridging nutritional inequities in her work. As a pediatric dietitian in gastroenterology, she works with children with celiac and inflammatory bowel diseases, food allergies, picky eating, and more, while exploring research and program development. Venus completed her Registered Dietitian training at Stanford Medicine and her Masters in Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University. Off the clock, she practices her polyglot skills, sings jazz, and subjects her husband to unconventional culinary creations.

Jenna Bernstein
MS, CCC-SLP, CLC
Jenna is a pediatric feeding and swallowing expert with experience at some of the largest children's hospitals in the United States. Since 2015, she has specialized in working with infants and children with complex cardiac anatomy and aerodigestive needs. Jenna loves to mentor fellow professionals and assist families in reaching their feeding goals.

Rachel Ruiz
MD, FAAP
Dr. Ruiz is a mom of three, a board-certified general pediatrician, and a pediatric gastroenterologist. She completed her undergraduate at Dartmouth College, doctorate of medicine and pediatrics residency at Vanderbilt University, and pediatric gastroenterology fellowship at Stanford University. Dr. Ruiz is an attending pediatric gastroenterologist at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center and an affiliated clinical instructor of pediatric gastroenterology at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford. She treats a wide range of children suffering from constipation, abdominal pain, swallowing difficulties, inadequate weight gain, inflammatory bowel disease, fatty liver and other liver diseases, and Celiac disease. In her part-time position at Solid Starts, Dr. Ruiz reviews content for evidence-based accuracy, analyzes choking data and trends, and is a trainer for Solid Starts PRO.

Sakina Bajowala
MD, FAAAAI
Dr. Bajowala is a mother of two and a board-certified adult and pediatric allergist and immunologist with a passion for patient education and advocacy. She specializes in the evaluation and management of food allergy, and is a best-selling author on the topic. In her private allergy practice, she helps her young patients overcome food allergies through precision-focused sublingual and oral immunotherapy. In her part-time position at Solid Starts, Dr. Bajowala reviews content for evidence-based accuracy, analyzes allergy data and trends, and is a trainer for Solid Starts PRO.

Solid Starts PRO Membership

Get Started with your PRO Membership

The content offered on SolidStarts.com is for informational purposes only. Solidstarts is not engaged in rendering professional advice, whether medical or otherwise, to individual users or their children or families. No content on this site, regardless of date, should ever be used as a substitute for direct medical advice from your doctor or your medical or health professional, nutritionist, or expert in pediatric feeding and eating. By accessing the content on SolidStarts.com, you acknowledge and agree that you are accepting the responsibility for your child’s health and well-being. In return for providing you with an array of content “baby-led weaning” information, you waive any claims that you or your child may have as a result of utilizing the content on SolidStarts.com.