Community Engaged Food Prescription Programs
This research seeks to address health disparities through the integration of food and nutrition security initiatives into healthcare systems. Food Is Medicine (FIM) interventions & Food Prescription Programs have the potential to manage and prevent diet-related health conditions, reduce healthcare utilization, and reduce food insecurity. Our Pediatric Food is Medicine aims to understand how to improve usage and acceptability of food prescription interventions as a tool to reach young children at risk for food and nutrition insecurity.
Pediatric Food is Medicine encompasses a community-engaged approach to develop and test two innovative food prescription interventions among 225 Medicaid families with children (ages 2-6) who have screened positive for food insecurity at local pediatric clinics. Each family will be randomized to one of three study groups. Each group will receive free food (focusing on fresh produce) every week for 26 weeks.
The control group will receive a mobile market-based produce prescription. One intervention group will receive either a customizable box of fresh produce or a choice of healthy meal kits/ recipes.
Outcomes will focus on:
- program utilization (enrollment, redemption, and food usage)
- fruit and vegetable consumption
- food and nutrition security
- cooking self-efficacy
We will qualitatively examine program implementation, secondary program impacts, and cost effectiveness. Together these aims will help understand how to address low utilization rates of food prescription programs with the goal of reducing health disparities among food insecure families with young children.
Pediatric Food is Medicine encompasses a community-engaged approach to develop and test two innovative food prescription interventions among 225 Medicaid families with children (ages 2-6) who have screened positive for food insecurity at local pediatric clinics. Each family will be randomized to one of three study groups. Each group will receive free food (focusing on fresh produce) every week for 26 weeks.
The control group will receive a mobile market-based produce prescription. One intervention group will receive either a customizable box of fresh produce or a choice of healthy meal kits/ recipes.
Outcomes will focus on:
- program utilization (enrollment, redemption, and food usage)
- fruit and vegetable consumption
- food and nutrition security
- cooking self-efficacy
We will qualitatively examine program implementation, secondary program impacts, and cost effectiveness. Together these aims will help understand how to address low utilization rates of food prescription programs with the goal of reducing health disparities among food insecure families with young children.
