Food & Health in 2017
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6 January 2017

The interconnection between Food & Health continues to be brought to the forefront of public discourse. Leaders from various fields are more motivated than ever to collaborate to strengthen the bond between good food and good health, resulting in improved health outcomes and quality of life, and meeting general consumer demands for healthier, more sustainably and transparently produced foods.apple_steth2

KK&P is working with Open Door Family Medical Center to implement the food and nutrition strategy that KK&P developed in 2016. This strategy includes trainings to augment the level of food and nutrition knowledge for staff, community programming (including cooking courses), and guidelines for healthy eating at Open Door events. The goal of the food strategy is for Open Door staff to “walk the walk” and improve the health outcomes of their patients through healthy nutrition. Federally qualified health centers such as Open Door have been focusing more on preventive health measures such as nutrition initiatives in an effort to improve long term health outcomes and as a result of mandates of the Affordable Care Act.

In December, KK&P hosted a Future of Food & Health Salon, bringing together leaders from the fields of medicine, finance, education, community health, and consumer packaged goods. We uncovered a number of topics that illustrated the need for greater information sharing between sectors in order for food to be used as an effective mechanism for improving health outcomes. The resulting webinar and deck are available here for more detail.cookingclassbackground2

Karen Karp also joined the advisory board of the Goldring Center for Culinary Medicine, a program at the Tulane University School of Medicine. Karen facilitated a successful $400,000 application to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to expand the Goldring Center’s culinary medicine curriculum in medical schools across the country.

BWaterAdditionally, KK&P worked with the Goldring Center to adapt their culinary medicine curriculum for nursing schools. The first school to launch this nursing curriculum is Northwest Arkansas Community College (NWACC) this winter. Culinary students at Brightwater: A Center for the Study of Food at NWACC will also have the opportunity to take this class, the first of its kind to simultaneously educate nursing students with culinary students. Brightwater opens in spring 2017

At KK&P, drawing connections between food and health has always been a driving force in our mission statement…but we’re glad to see the connection has taken more space in the spotlight recently, and aim to keep the momentum driving forward.