Research Highlights :
Embargoed until 8:30 a.m. CT/9:30 a.m. ET , Wednesday, March 20, 2024
CHICAGO, March 20, 2024 — Programs that provided free, weekly home delivery of fresh fruits and vegetable from local farms helped improve recipients’ nutrition levels, physical activity levels and cardiovascular disease risk factors, according to preliminary research to be presented at the American Heart Association’s Epidemiology and Prevention│Lifestyle and Cardiometabolic Scientific Sessions 2024 , held March 18- 21, in Chicago. The meeting offers the latest science on population-based health and wellness and implications for lifestyle.
“We all know that eating healthier foods, like fruits and vegetables, is good for you, however, sometimes we focus too much on finding a simple solution rather than taking small, preventative measures to improve health,” said lead study author Lisa Goldman Rosas, Ph.D., M.P.H., an assistant professor in the department of epidemiology and population health and the department of medicine at Stanford School of Medicine in Palo Alto, California. “’Food as Medicine’ programs, such as the Recipe4Health program we studied, aim to shift the focus to ensuring a healthy diet including fresh fruits and vegetables is consistently accessible and affordable to all people to help improve health outcomes.”
Recipe4Health is a program in Alameda County, California, that provided free, weekly deliveries of locally grown produce to adults who received health care at one local Federally Qualified Health Center. For 16 weeks, participants received free home delivery of approximately 16 servings of fresh fruits and vegetables. The health centers are federally funded, nonprofit facilities providing health care to people in communities that are medically underserved.
Researchers surveyed participants about their diet, physical activity and their level of food insecurity before and after the 16-week program of free produce delivery. To assess food insecurity, the questions included, for example, how often they run out of food and how often they lack money to buy more food.
Analysis of the participants’ survey responses found that at the end of the 16-week free produce program, they had:
The American Heart Association recommends that individuals consume four to five servings of vegetables and fruits each day and engage in at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity physical activity each week.
“I was really excited to see that providing patients with a modest amount of locally grown produce resulted in improvements in food insecurity, diet and indicators of cardiovascular health. This study took place during the COVID-19 pandemic, when many of these outcomes were worsening, especially among patients receiving care at Federally Qualified Health Centers that were disproportionately impacted,” Rosas said.
In a second analysis, researchers analyzed changes in cardiovascular disease risk factors one year after the free, fresh produce program began, which ended after 16 weeks. When comparing Recipe4Health participants with adults receiving care at other Federally Qualified Health Centers in the same county that had not instituted the free produce deliveries, researchers found that, after one year, participants in the free produce program had:
“It is possible that additional strategies are needed to change body mass index and blood pressure. Additional strategies may include behavioral interventions and pharmacotherapy in conjunction with a Food as Medicine program,” Rosas said.
Study details and background:
The study had several limitations including small sample sizes for some of the blood test measures, since many participants did not visit the lab during the pandemic. Additionally, findings about diet and physical activity levels were from surveys completed by Recipe4Health program participants, however, this information was not collected from a control group.
The researchers noted that their future work will involve exploring different strategies for delivering food, evaluating the effects of medically supportive groceries (foods that are approved by a registered dietitian or nutritionist), engaging diverse patient groups, such as those with Type 2 diabetes or cancer, people who live in rural areas and children.
The Association is working to improve access to healthy food among people receiving treatment for chronic health conditions and people at high risk for such conditions. The Association’s Health Care by Food TM initiative is investing in research, advocacy and education to show clinical benefit and cost effectiveness of interventions that use food as medicine are covered by public and private health insurance.
“This research demonstrates the potential for a food prescription, accessible through a health care visit, to improve health outcomes for significant portions of the U.S. population,” said Kevin Volpp, M.D., Ph.D., the Mark V. Pauly Professor at the Perelman School of Medicine and the Wharton School, director of the Penn Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics and research lead for the Association’s Health Care by Food TM initiative. “A coordinated research approach is needed to more systematically and rigorously define how well food is medicine interventions prevent and treat disease compared to standard medical care.”
Co-authors, their disclosures and funding sources are listed in the abstract.
Statements and conclusions of studies that are presented at the American Heart Association’s scientific meetings are solely those of the study authors and do not necessarily reflect the Association’s policy or position. The Association makes no representation or guarantee as to their accuracy or reliability. Abstracts presented at the Association’s scientific meetings are not peer-reviewed, rather, they are curated by independent review panels and are considered based on the potential to add to the diversity of scientific issues and views discussed at the meeting. The findings are considered preliminary until published as a full manuscript in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.
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The American Heart Association’s EPI│Lifestyle Scientific Sessions 2024 is the world’s premier meeting dedicated to the latest advances in population-based science. EPI│Lifestyle Scientific Sessions 2024 is in-person only, Monday through Thursday, March 18-21 at the Hilton Chicago. The primary goal of the meeting is to promote the development and application of translational and population science to prevent heart disease and stroke and foster cardiovascular health. The sessions focus on risk factors, obesity, nutrition, physical activity, genetics, metabolism, biomarkers, subclinical disease, clinical disease, healthy populations, global health and prevention-oriented clinical trials. The Councils on Epidemiology and Prevention and Lifestyle and Cardiometabolic Health (Lifestyle) jointly planned the EPI│Lifestyle Scientific Sessions 2024. Follow the conference on Twitter at #EPILifestyle24 .
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