Physician assistant students learn how to integrate culinary medicine into future practice | Intelligence services

East Carolina University’s Department of Nutritional Sciences has launched a pilot program to teach future healthcare providers the ins and outs of food and how to prepare nutritious meals so they can integrate culinary medicine into their practices and pass on health-promoting food knowledge to their patients.

Farm2Clinic Associate Director Brandon Stroud shares cooking tips with resident students during a culinary medicine course.

Dr. Lauren Sastre, assistant professor of nutritional sciences in the College of Allied Health Sciences, said the culinary medicine initiative is important because even well-trained health care students often do not understand the details of macro- and micronutrients and how they impact overall health. Probably just as important, Sastre said, many people are hindered by not having the resources to finance health-promoting foods and practice basic cooking skills.

Sastre said the idea of ​​introducing allied health students to the concept of culinary medicine — combining the art of cooking with the science of nutrition — has been with her since she first attended a public health conference nearly a decade ago was introduced to the idea, became more and more widespread. which has been incorporated into the curriculum of some medical schools across the country.

Promoting culinary medicine by allied health professionals is not a new concept, but the idea of ​​food as medicine is not yet well established in health care. One notable exception is Jessica DeLuise, a physician assistant who, like The Wellness Kitchenista, promotes food as the key to health on television and social media.

Sastre and her team have made great strides in recent years with the Farm2Clinic initiative, which brings the concepts of culinary medicine to communities in desperate need of encouraging better eating habits.

“One of the important parts of our Farm2Clinic program is helping people understand that making healthy, great-tasting food isn’t that hard,” Sastre said. “So I dug into the literature, just with medical students. You don’t see that with PA students or nursing students.”

Physician assistant students serve food they prepared as part of a culinary medicine experience.

It was relatively easy to gain access to physician assistant students because they are part of the same college as the Department of Nutritional Sciences and Sastre has a close relationship with the College of Nursing, which is right next door on the Health Sciences Campus.

Over the summer, Sastre was contacted by a colleague in the physician assistant (PA) program to confirm the nutrition training that Sastre had provided to students for several years. Sastre offered an alternative: Why not incorporate a more comprehensive food literacy workshop into the allotted time, including budgeting and basic nutritional science and cooking skills?

“I want to make sure we arm them with information that impacts patient care,” Sastre said. “We have so many nutritional problems in the United States that 90% of our health care spending is dedicated to treating a chronic disease – now pretty much everyone has one.” These chronic diseases, such as diabetes and high blood pressure, are caused by poor dietary habits, and yet they offer We do not provide comprehensive nutrition training to our healthcare providers.”

Not everyone can afford to see a nutritionist, Sastre said, but it’s very likely they will seek primary care from a physician’s assistant or nurse practitioner. Shaping the way these first-line providers advise their patients is a good step forward in chronic disease management.

Closing the skills gap

One of the cultural shifts that Sastre says is contributing to the current health situation in North Carolina and across the U.S. is the near collapse of home economics instruction in schools—housekeeping is one of the skills many adults lack.

“There have been people for decades who don’t even have basic knowledge of nutrition. We could have a fancy culinary medicine class and teach fancy things, but if someone isn’t able to bring healthy food into their home, we don’t check the boxes,” Sastre said. “What we’ve done with this class of pilots is more comprehensive.”

Kinston’s Raven Breinholt, a public health graduate, research associate and Farm2Clinic coordinator who received her Bachelor of Science in Nutrition and Dietetics from ECU in 2023, worked with PA students on basic cooking skills and mentored her fellow students during the culinary medicine day preparing a cabbage and turkey casserole. The simple dish was an example of how easily and gently a nutritious, balanced meal can be prepared.

As part of a culinary medicine course, medical assistants cut vegetables for use in a meal.

“When working with patients, it is important to understand patients’ different socio-demographic backgrounds and how this impacts their ability to prepare healthy foods. “It’s really hard to buy fruits and vegetables,” Breinholt said, but it’s doable.

Combine a lack of kitchen skills with food prices that are unaffordable for many people, and it’s no wonder many people turn to cheap, over-processed and unhealthy foods, Breinholt said. She said an interdisciplinary approach is the best advancement for ECU’s nutritional sciences faculty, as well as students and their fellow students in allied health disciplines, nursing and medicine.

“We should work together as a team to ensure that every patient receives the best possible care, and we must start building those relationships now,” Breinholt said.

Kendra Brent, a second-year assistant student from Bristol, Tennessee, said cooking is a big part of her life, but the demands of the PA program kept her from getting into the kitchen far more than she would like.

She knows that rural areas of North Carolina and her home in Tennessee don’t always have the best eating habits — “we love all things fried” — but the opportunity to learn from Sastre and her students how to change patients’ minds Food was motivating.

“This is really cool because it gives me ideas on how to educate my patients. It’s doable; it’s possible,” Brent said.

Brent said the focus on nutrition is a welcome change from the disease-heavy focus of the PA program’s coursework. Working with her nutrition colleagues who are in a different program but equally focused on improving health in the area made Brent feel like she was all on the same team, working toward the same goal.

“It was great working with them. You see a whole new side of medicine that I didn’t even know existed. I didn’t know culinary medicine existed until this morning. It’s great to know they’re a resource out there,” Brent said.

Food is a central part of a person’s sense of self, a part of a culture, and Sastre knows that fundamentally changing the food choices of most Americans will be a challenge.

“In some ways we have to take a step backwards to move forward,” Sastre said, but she remains motivated to continue fighting for change alongside students from various disciplines across the health care spectrum.

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