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HEALTH CARE FOOD AND ACTIVITY ENVIRONMENTS ENACT STRATEGY: Food Policy Adopt a comprehensive food policy that develops nutrition, health, and environmental guidelines for purchasing to ensure cafeteria meals, patient meals, and vending machines include healthy and sustainable choices Health facilities across the country are working to introduce healthier and more nutritious foods and beverages into cafeterias, vending machines, and patient meals. Nutrition is one element of developing standards for food purchasing, but hospitals can also establish policies that support foods that have been produced in a sustainable manner. Elements of sustainably produced foods can include local/regional foods, organic and/or food produced without pesticides, hormones, or chemicals, antibiotic-free meat and poultry, dairy, humane treatment towards animals, and just treatment of farm workers. As health care institutions continue to be a pillar institution in our everyday health, it is important that they role model for staff, patients, and other institutions food purchasing practices that promote and protect human health and the environment. Applying nutrition, health and environmental standards to all cafeteria meals, patient meals, and vending machines items will provide employees and visitors with healthy food options and promote overall well being. Hospital food policies can include the following standards for cafeteria meals, patient meals, and vending machines:
Food and Food Purchasing: A Role for Health Care (PDF) This brochure highlights how hospitals can purchase local and sustainable foods that will impact community health on several levels.
Serving Local Food at Your Meeting (PDF) This document is a quick and easy pamphlet provide by the Society for Nutrition Education, on why and how to bring local produce to your meetings and conferences. The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy's report includes case studies about health care organizations who have made innovative efforts to change their food environment including those who have adopted food policies to express preference for organic and/or local foods, and implemented healthy vending machine policies. This article highlights Kaiser Permanente’s efforts to provide healthier options in vending machines and their health care institutions. Click here to link to the actual policy language. Healthy Food in Health Care: A Pledge for Fresh, Local, Sustainable Food (PDF) Take the pledge now! Health Care without Harm has developed a pledge that is a framework for hospitals working to develop food purchasing policies that are support health and the environment.
Building a Successful Local Food Model – Tips for Institutional Buyers This is a quick guide for food purchasers for larger institutions that would like to start purchasing sustainable foods and establish a sustainable food purchasing policy. A Guide to Developing a Sustainable Food Purchasing Policy (PDF) This document developed by Food Alliance is intended to help hospitals and other institutions, as well as those advocating for food system change, create, promote and implement practical sustainable food purchasing policies. A Purchaser's Guide to Sourcing Sustainable Poultry (PDF) This guide gives consumers a good preview of the key elements to consider when sourcing sustainable poultry. A Purchasing Guide to Sourcing Food Produced Without Genetically Engineered Ingredients (PDF) This guide includes 5 steps to purchasing food that is not genetically engineered, as well as a sample letter and questionnaire regarding the issue. AMA Supports Local Sustainable Food Systems San Francisco Department of Public Health (PDF) This policy adopted by the San Francisco Department of public health articulates that food purchased for SFDPH events should make an effort to be local and organic. Kaiser Permanente's Comprehensive Food Policy to Promote Individual and Environmental Health (PDF) This policy outlines the Kaiser Permanente’s values for purchasing in order to support a sustainable food system. Catholic HealthCare West Food & Nutrition Services Vision Statement (PDF) This policy recognizes that food production and distribution systems have wide ranging impacts on the quality of ecosystems and communities.
University of Virginia Medical Center The University of Virginia Medical Center introduced a healthy vending machine policy designed to better inform consumers about the choices they are making. Health Collaborative of Bexar County The Health Collaborative of Bexar County, Texas (San Antonio) developed Healthy Vending Guidelines (PDF) with criteria and rationale for healthy items to include in vending machines. Health Care Without Harm is an international organization working with hospitals to improve their food purchasing practice to support health and the environment. Sustainable Food Policy Project The Sustainable Food Policy Project’s goal is to support efforts by educational, healthcare and other institutions to have a positive impact on the food system through purchasing. The website is a resources for other food purchasing policies, food policy language and articulation, and provides a space for learning and lessons learned. This white paper prepared by The Center for Health Design and Health Care Without Harm for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation explores the health and environmental consequences of current food production, distribution, and procurement methods. Additionally, the paper highlights how health facilities are changing to more sustainable food purchasing practices and how these practices support human health and the environment.
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