Kaiser Permanente Unveils Food is Medicine Center of Excellence
Kaiser Permanente’s new Food is Medicine Center of Excellence will “combine clinical services, research, education and community engagement,” according to the organization.
Kaiser Permanente’s new Food is Medicine Center of Excellence will “combine clinical services, research, education and community engagement,” according to the organization.
FarmboxRx's new maternal health program sends members a food box, along with educational content to support them during their pregnancy. This content focuses on a variety of topics, including prenatal and postpartum care visit compliance, postpartum mental health, immunizations and prenatal and postpartum nutrition.
Kellogg CEO Gary Pilnick recently encouraged families struggling to put food on the table to turn to cereal as their go-to dinner option. Food-as-medicine executives are none too thrilled about his comments — they argue that the remarks underscore the dire need to increase public education about affordable, healthy meal planning.
Foodsmart is rolling out its new program that enables doctors to refer their patients to Foodsmart's dieticians and healthy eating platform, as well as write prescriptions for healthy food just as easily as they might a normal pharmacy prescription. The initiative is being rolled out at Advocate Health, Intermountain Health and Memorial Hermann Health System.
Instacart and DispatchHealth recently launched a partnership that allows DispatchHealth to provide food interventions to patients in need of nutrition support.
As the food as medicine movement grows, some payers and healthcare organizations are carving out specific roles and teams dedicated to food and nutrition. Doing so can be beneficial considering the significant impact diet can have on health outcomes.
The contributors to food insecurity include age, having a disability, being on a fixed income and being a single parent, according to a recent report from FarmboxRx.
By acquiring clinical assets from Wellory, Season Health will be able to greatly expand its provider network. The company will also gain national contracts with Aetna and Cigna.
In the future, research in personalized nutrition needs to focus on understanding the role of nutrition throughout the entire lifespan and address diet-related conditions through comprehensive interventions that go beyond simply choosing healthy foods.
The food as medicine movement is gaining momentum, but there are several challenges, according to a PitchBook report. These challenges include resistance to diet restrictions and difficulty in tracking compliance.
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
Highmark Health has been launching a series of initiatives to support the "food as medicine" movement, including a program that provides some West Virginia residents with debit cards to purchase healthy food at Dollar General stores.
FarmboxRx’s new program, called Feed by FarmboxRx, will supply 200 people affected by SNAP cuts with one box of mixed fresh produce and one box of pantry items each month for six months. They'll also receive educational materials on how to prepare the food.
Employers have a responsibility to support the food as medicine movement and help employees who are food insecure, said Jay Bhatt, managing director of Deloitte Services and managing director of the Center for Health Solutions and Health Equity Institute. He made these comments last week at the MedCity INVEST conference in Chicago.
It shouldn't be so hard for Americans to access healthy foods, said Dr. Elizabeth Klodas, founder of healthy food company Step One Foods, during a Tuesday panel at the MedCity INVEST conference in Chicago. There should be incentives for food companies and better nutrition education for Americans.
With obesity, diabetes, and heart disease rapidly growing among communities of color, we need to do everything we can to help people sustain healthy eating habits. It’ll take more nuance than a Westernized one-size-fits-all diet.