An increasing number of medical schools are adopting lifestyle medicine and preventive care into their curricula, according to a Dec. 18 post from the Association of American Medical Colleges.
Nutrition is one lifestyle medicine component medical schools are readily integrating, the AAMC said, amid larger efforts to upgrade training.
Some health systems, including New York City-based NYC Health + Hospitals and Grand Rapids and Southfield, Mich.-based Corewell Health, tailor lifestyle medicine programs for patients with chronic diseases. At Corewell, a virtual care team at Nudj Health works with the system’s clinical expertise in nutrition, physical activity, stress management and behavior change to improve patient outcomes.
Participants in the system’s lifestyle medicine program saw a 44% decrease in depression scores and a 46% increase in minutes spent exercising each day, among other improvements.
Several medical schools have a lifestyle medicine track, while others offer electives and extracurriculars, such as culinary medicine or teaching kitchens, according to the AAMC. The association highlighted medical schools at West Virginia University in Morgantown, UTHealth Houston, University of South Carolina in Columbia and Loma Linda (Calif.) University for their lifestyle medicine programs.
Read more here.
