{"id":23347,"date":"2020-12-14T02:36:05","date_gmt":"2020-12-14T02:36:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=23347"},"modified":"2020-12-15T12:38:13","modified_gmt":"2020-12-15T12:38:13","slug":"a-hospital-that-prescribes-free-nutritious-food-to-families-who-need-more-than-medical-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/a-hospital-that-prescribes-free-nutritious-food-to-families-who-need-more-than-medical-care\/","title":{"rendered":"A hospital that prescribes free nutritious food to families who need more than medical care"},"content":{"rendered":"

Diana Cuy Castellanos<\/a>, University of Dayton<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Being food-insecure<\/a> \u2013 unable to get enough nutritious food to meet your needs \u2013 can take a toll on your health. So Dayton Children\u2019s Hospital has begun to screen its patients and their families for this problem and refer them to what it\u2019s calling the \u201cFood Pharm<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

This program, which launched about two years ago, currently aims to provide about 55 families per month with enough healthy food, such as whole grain pasta, beans and green beans, to feed a family of four for three days<\/a> while also connecting them with other resources to help them get through the rest of the week.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also taking care to ensure that this one-time donation of nutritious food is culturally appropriate<\/a>, meaning that people know how to prepare and consume the food they receive and it fits with their culture and beliefs. For example, it\u2019s not culturally appropriate to give people tofu if they\u2019ve never seen it or cooked with it, or to give devout Muslims pork.<\/p>\n

Participating families get a box of fruits, vegetables, dairy products, proteins and grains. Families also get some help, if they are eligible, enrolling in the government\u2019s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program<\/a>, as well as taking nutrition classes. The Food Pharm also connects the families of patients with food pantries near their homes so they might get more access to free food on a regular basis.<\/p>\n

Being food-insecure comes with health risks<\/h2>\n

About 11% of all Americans and 25% of U.S. children are food-insecure<\/a>. An even larger share of the population of Dayton<\/a>, Ohio suffers from food insecurity: roughly 17%. And the number of people in Dayton who can\u2019t get enough nutritious food is increasing during the coronavirus pandemic<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Among other things, being food-insecure increases the potential for obesity, heart disease and diabetes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Troublingly, food-insecure kids are more likely to fare poorly at school than other children and to become socially isolated<\/a>.<\/p>\n

As a registered dietitian<\/a>, I am voluntarily assisting this program to evaluate how well it works.
\nWe don\u2019t yet know how culturally appropriate the boxes are, or whether participating families actually eat all of the food provided. Dayton Children\u2019s Hospital\u2019s Food Pharm will look into those questions and use the information gleaned to make any necessary adjustments.<\/p>\n

[Like what you\u2019ve read? Want more?<\/em> Sign up for The Conversation\u2019s daily newsletter<\/a>.]\"The<\/p>\n

Diana Cuy Castellanos<\/a>, Assistant Professor of Dietetics and Nutrition, University of Dayton<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Diana Cuy Castellanos, University of Dayton Being food-insecure \u2013 unable to get enough nutritious food to meet your needs \u2013 can take a toll on your health. So Dayton Children\u2019s Hospital has begun to screen its patients and their families for this problem and refer them to what it\u2019s calling the \u201cFood Pharm.\u201d This program, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":23348,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[42],"tags":[4128,8227,3465,2420,3050,803,6817],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23347"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23347"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23347\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23359,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23347\/revisions\/23359"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}