FOOD AS MEDICINE
If Nelson Campbell ran things, we’d eat fewer processed foods and munch more on veggies and fruit. Lee Memorial Health System administrators are moving the giant provider in the same direction. They may be right.
If Nelson Campbell could run the world, its citizenry would munch on only fruit, nuts and veggies. No meat, little dairy and even fewer processed foods. Campbell would also decree restrictions on caffeine, salt, soda and alcohol―the things researchers insist help make Americans among the unhealthiest on the planet. A plant-based or whole food diet, says Campbell, whose nutrition work in North Carolina and Kentucky was documented in the film PlantPure Nation, can help us lose weight, limit diseases, even stop cancers and diabetes, he says. His father, pioneering nutritionist T. Colin Campbell, co-authored The China Study, an examination of Chinese villages showing the stark advantages of plant nutrition. The book has sold a million c opies.
The vision of food as medicine has resonated with Lee Memorial Health System. It has entered into a cooperative with Nelson Campbell’s nonprofit PlantPure Nation, which promotes plant-based or whole food diets. PlantPure Nation also has a business component selling plant-based meal packages. But it’s Campbell’s nutritional advocacy and the popular documentary that have placed him before the public.
Lee Memorial doctors have begun prescribing plant-based diets and light exercise for those with hypertension and pre-diabetic/ weight problems. It’s termed a lifestyle change, sometimes complemented with statins and other medicine. But the goal is get us off meds―entirely. The partners will not exchange services or cash, but will introduce Southwest Florida to Nelson’s ideas, his 10day plant diets and to programs promoting wellness and veggie-style recipes. PlantPure Nation “pods” or support groups are also forming in Florida. The first meeting of a Fort Myers pod in May brought dozens of curious visitors; many now embracing beans over beef.
“OUR GOAL IS TO IMPACT, EVEN REVERSE, CHRONIC DISEASE. WE WOULD LIKE EVERYONE TO ADOPT HEALTHY HABITS. IT IS THE CORE OF OUR MISSION. IT’S A VERY EXCITING TIME.” —SCOTT KASHMAN, CHIEF ADMINISTRATOR AT LEE MEMORIAL’S CAPE CORAL HOSPITAL
Campbell’s 10-day “Jumpstart” programs, for example, place Lee Memorial patients on restrictive plant diets. Most patients already show sharp drops in bad cholesterol and other risks, and are feeling composed and clear-headed, Lee Memorial administrators say.
The move away from meat to plant diets is gaining energy in America, with its estimated 7.3 million vegetarians, and about 23 million choosing some form of a veggie diet. Research says one-third of Americans are eating less meat, many under age 40―although older Americans still report eating meat up to three times a week. The diet or weight-loss industry is a $60 billion market, with 100 million Americans at a given time striving to lose pounds, research shows.
Yet we remain a nation of casualties―a third of us are considered obese, 70 percent as overweight, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Everyone clamors for a magic pill to help make them thinner and to pump pure blood. Recognizing these issues, Lee Memorial in 2013 did introduce a Complete Health Improvement Program, or CHIP, in its coronary care departments. Those results have also been startling, administrators say, prompting the further shift with the PlantPure Nation partnership. Lee Memorial has also introduced an integrative medicine component in Bonita that includes naturopathy and homeopathy treatments, a blending of Western technology and Eastern methodology. Although insurance doesn’t cover such care, people seeking a new approach are lining up at the door, says Dr. Heather Auld, the integrative medicine program’s director.
Understanding the public’s zeal for PlantPure Nation and changes in diet was evidenced at the formal announcement of the partnership. More than a thousand Southwest Floridians attended the April event at First Christian Church in Fort Myers. The gathering had a revival-like feel—young and old in church pews hooted and applauded the message as T. Colin Campbell delivered opening remarks and a quick overview of his work in the 1980s. When he explained his work in China, you could hear a pin drop. A plant-based diet was determined to be a key in healthy villages in the research, Campbell ended up writing in The China
Study. “But the real science,” he wrote, “has been buried beneath a clutter of irrelevant or even harmful information―junk science, fad diets and food industry propaganda.”
Scott Kashman, chief administrator at Lee Memorial’s Cape Coral Hospital, and Nelson Campbell also spoke. Campbell talked about his documentary, a sequel being filmed and his vision for introducing plant-based diets to minority and rural communities.
Campbell at the event noted that Lee Memorial and a
Midland, Texas, hospital are the first system providers to embrace and introduce plant-based diets and treatment choices. “The current [health care] model is not sustainable,” Nelson Campbell said a few weeks after his April visit. “Lee Memorial is an example of forward-looking leadership, of demonstrating genuine social change.”
What Lee Memorial is doing with PlantPure Nation and with its own programs is quite startling, considering the ramifications of a potentially healthier community, Kashman and others in the health field acknowledge. Other than the obvious motivator to fix us when we’re broken, health providers are businesses. The health industry’s revenue this year should exceed $1.6 trillion, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and 64 percent of that is spent on p atient care. There are 17 million American health care workers; Lee Memorial is Southwest Florida’s largest employer. Plus, the feds alone will spend $40 billion on health care, which further helps providers such as Lee Memorial. Research shows the revenue pie will only expand as the country ages, especially in Southwest Florida.
It’s not all roses, of course. The health industry argues that Americans want affordable and reliable care, yet neglect to keep healthy. Critics also argue that school meals, for example, may feature fried or high-sodium foods, bread and sauces on a child’s lunch tray. We are conditioned to eat processed or packaged foods that are little more than garbage, health advocates say. Sarah Wu, a Chicago teacher and the Fed Up With School Lunch blogger, for instance, writes of her first school meal: “I couldn’t believe that this was the kind of food my students were being served, especially knowing that most of them came from low-income families and that this was probably their most substantial meal of the day … their bodies demand decent nourishment from school lunches.”
Kashman explains, “Our goal is to impact, even reverse, chronic disease. We would like everyone to adopt healthy habits. It is the core of our mission. It’s a very exciting time.”
Since 2013, CHIP’s plant diets have mostly targeted volunteer patients with hypertension and who are at risk of heart conditions. CHIP produced astonishing results, says Rowe Hudson, director of Lee Health Solutions, the Lee Memorial department driving the changes. Blood pressure, cholesterol and blood sugar numbers were significantly lowered, Hudson says. Energy and optimism for many patients are prompting further investigation into PlantPure Nation. “It was really very exciting,” Hudson says of CHIP results.
So Lee Memorial is going system-wide, prescribing the 10-day “Jumpstart” programs and suggesting other lifestyle changes, before turning to medications, or at least combining diet and some meds, says Kashman. “We w ant to get [patients] truly healthy, to change their frame of mind―to use food as medicine.” Craig Garrett is Group Editor-in-Chief for TOTI Media.