Kaiser Permanente, the nation's largest nonprofit health system, established its Food Is Medicine Center of Excellence on April 11.
The center will use evidence-based solutions to tackle food and nutrition insecurity, plus diet-related chronic diseases, the Oakland, Calif.-based system said in a news release.
A National Institutes of Health framework inspired the center's framework, which will allow Kaiser to broaden screening for food insecurity and nutrition status, increase clinical nutrition training, and promote other organizations to adopt similar programs.
"Food Is Medicine includes targeted interventions such as medically tailored meals, produce prescriptions, culinary medicine, nutrition counseling and programs that help people access and afford healthy food to effectively treat a range of diet-driven diseases, including heart disease, diabetes and hypertension," the release said.
Kaiser also committed $2 million to the Share Our Strength organization to boost enrollment in a new federal food assistance program, Summer EBT, which provides grocery benefits to families when kids are out of school. In recent years, the system has helped 125,000 people apply for federal grocery benefits, enrolled 2,100 members and offered more than 116,000 medically tailored meals.