Food Prescription Program honored by state health care association
The Michigan Health and Hospital Association honored Shape Up North, a community collaborative coordinated by Munson Medical Center, with its Ludwig Community Benefit Award for efforts to improve community health through a food prescription program.
The award was presented to Shape Up North’s Rural Fruit and Vegetable Prescription Program at the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island today.
“We are honored to have our program recognized by the MHA. The Ludwig Award is given to health care organizations that demonstrate community benefit by improving the health and well-being of their communities,” said Alyson Kass, program coordinator. “This program, along with its many partners, has helped model a way to impact rural community’s health and wellness through healthy local foods.”
Under the 2016 pilot project, funded by a Michigan Department of Health and Human Services grant, 170 chronic disease patients from Munson Family Practice qualified for the pilot program. They received instruction in healthy eating and filled their prescriptions for fruit and vegetables at the Farmer’s Market in the Grand Traverse Commons.
The program is being expanded this year to Benzie County and to additional physician offices in the Traverse City area. Grants to expand the program will allow up to 550 patients to participate in 2017.
The MHA award comes with a $3,000 gift from the MHA Health Foundation’s Community Health Improvement Fund. “We plan to use the $3,000 to continue expansion of the program for the 2018 market season,” Kass said.
Learn more about Shape Up North.