How to Scale Food is Medicine: Data, Partnerships, and Societal Change

Food is Medicine interventions are helping people become more food secure, have healthier diets, and improve clinical outcomes. That’s why, with support from The Rockefeller Foundation, the American Heart Association’s Health Care by Food^™ initiative is trying to connect patients with access to healthy foods as part of their clinical care, so they can better manage their diet and improve their health. Right now, that means figuring out the best way to integrate Food is Medicine programs into the healthcare system, examining what kinds of healthy food interventions are working for different kinds of patients, and how best to reach them.  

Dr. Kevin Volpp, the scientific lead of Health Care by Food and the director of the University of Pennsylvania Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics, is both a primary care clinician and a behavioral economist who has seen firsthand the serious obstacles people face when attempting to alter their eating habits to prioritize future health.