Clinicians Need More Training in Nutrition Education and Spotting Hunger, Biden Says

MedPage Today (09/28/22) Frieden, Joyce

President Biden announced at a conference on September 28 that clinicians require additional training in nutrition education and recognizing hunger symptoms. In this vein, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and the anti-hunger nonprofit group Share Our Strength plan to provide training to all 67,000 AAP member pediatricians on screening for nutrition insecurity and referring patients to federal and community nutrition programs. Meanwhile, the American College of Lifestyle Medicine will contribute 5.5 hours of continuing medical education course credits on nutrition and "food is medicine" subjects to 100,000 providers in areas where diet-related disease is concentrated. The college will also coordinate with the American Board of Lifestyle Medicine to cover half the expense of lifestyle medicine training/certification for 1,400 primary care providers. The Association of American Medical Colleges and the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education will also arrange and host the inaugural Medical Education Summit on Nutrition in Practice next March, where 150 education leaders will highlight, discuss, and formulate strategies for incorporating nutrition and food insecurity into medical education curricula, and emphasize interprofessional care and health equity. Various other provider organizations have committed to enhancing health professionals' nutrition education — for example by ensuring that hunger, nutrition, and lifestyle topics constitute at least 5% of board certification exam questions for primary and subspecialty professional training programs.

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