Essential: A Food is Medicine Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Technical and general information from the podcast's RSS feed.

Essential: A Food is Medicine Podcast

Food is Medicine Coalition

Health & Fitness

Science

Frequency: 1 episode/121d. Total Eps: 2

Essential: A Food is Medicine podcast centers the lived experiences of clients, caregivers, clinicians, and frontline staff to explore the foundations of the modern food is medicine movement. Through human-first storytelling, the series illustrates why medically tailored meals (MTMs) and nutrition interventions are not a “nice to have,” but services evolved over decades to become essential, foundational components of healthcare. This series, hosted by Alissa Wassung, executive director of the Food is Medicine Coalition (FIMC), highlights leaders across various aspects of food is medicine services, amplifying fieldwide experts innovating in FIM service.

Recent rankings

Latest chart positions across Apple Podcasts and Spotify rankings.

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

No recent rankings available

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

Links found in episode descriptions and other podcasts that share them.

See all

http://www.fimcoalition.org/
2 shares
https://fimcoalition.org/about-fimc/our-model/
2 shares
https://fimcoalition.org/about-fimc/
2 shares

https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2024.01307
2 shares

RSS feed quality and score

Technical evaluation of the podcast's RSS feed quality and structure.

See all

RSS feed quality

Good

Score global : 72%

Publication history

Monthly episode publishing history over the past years.

Year

Latest published episodes

Recent episodes with titles, durations, and descriptions.

See all

Is Food Actually Medicine?

Season 1 · Episode 1

Wednesday, September 30, 2026 • Duration 20:59

What does the research really tell us about the connection between nutrition and health? In the first episode of Essential: A Food is Medicine Podcast, host Alissa Wassung from the Food is Medicine Coalition sits down with researcher Dr. Kurt Hager to explore the growing evidence behind Food is Medicine interventions, including medically tailored meals. They discuss what studies are showing about health outcomes, hospitalizations and healthcare costs—and why nutrition deserves a place in healthcare.

Along the way, you’ll hear from Jules, a Community Servings client who received medically tailored meals while managing gestational diabetes during pregnancy and postpartum.

Essential is a four-part podcast series from the Food is Medicine Coalition exploring why medically tailored nutrition is an essential part of healthcare.

--------------

Podcast Speakers:

Dr. Kurt Hager – Assistant Professor, Population & Quantitative Health Sciences, UMass Chan Medical School

Alissa Wassung – Executive Director, Food is Medicine Coalition

Jules - Community Servings Client

Rebecca Kahn– Director of Nutrition Services, Food & Friends

--------------

Research Articles:

Hager K, Cudhea FP, Wong JB, et al. Association of National Expansion of Insurance Coverage of Medically Tailored Meals With Estimated Hospitalizations and Health Care Expenditures in the US. JAMA Netw Open. 2022;5(10):e2236898. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.36898
Deng, S., Hager, K., Wang, L., Cudhea, F. P., Wong, J. B., Kim, D. D., & Mozaffarian, D. (2025). Estimated Impact Of Medically Tailored Meals On Health Care Use And Expenditures In 50 US States. Health affairs (Project Hope), 44(4), 433–442. https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2024.01307
Hager, K., Alcusky, M., Zhang, F. F., Sing, G., Ash, A., Mick, E., Terranova, J., DiBacco, E., Buckler, S., Rich, A., Bowman, J., Folta, S., Prendergast, K., Frank, J., Ball, C., Chiang, J. S., & Mozaffarian, D. (2026). Medically tailored meals receipt and healthcare utilization and costs in Massachusetts' Medicaid demonstration. Nature medicine, 32(6), 2147–2154. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-026-04407-5
Hager K, Berkowitz SA. The Future of Nutrition Interventions in Medicaid. JAMA Intern Med. 2026;186(4):398–400. doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2025.7194
Clark, J. M., Maw, M. T. T., Pettway, K., Chander, G., Elias, S., Zisow-McClean, S., Maruthur, N. M., & Greer, R. C. (2025). Impact of Medically Tailored Meals on Clinical Outcomes Among Low-Income Adults with Type 2 Diabetes: A Pilot Randomized Trial. Journal of general internal medicine, 40(8), 1711–1719. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11606-024-09248-x

--------------

FIMC Resources

About FIMC: https://fimcoalition.org/about-fimc/
Client Stories: https://fimcoalition.org/food-is-medicine-stories/
Find a FIMC Agency: https://fimcoalition.org/find-agency/ - Nearly fifty nonprofits are members of the coalition and collectively delivered millions of meals and meal equivalents to individuals last year. Find services using the link above.

Medically Tailored Meals Definition: https://fimcoalition.org/about-fimc/our-model/

A Medically Tailored Meal (MTM) is a component of the MTM Intervention. MTMs are meals delivered to individuals of all ages who live with severe, chronic, or complex illness(es) and/or experience activities of daily living limitations, as deemed necessary by a healthcare professional and defined in the Food is Medicine Coalition (FIMC) MTM Accreditation Criteria and Requirements. A Registered Dietitian Nutritionist (RDN) tailors meal plans to meet the medical needs of the client according to the FIMC Nutrition Standards. MTMs are designed to improve health outcomes, lower cost of care and increase client satisfaction.

Research: https://fimcoalition.org/research/

Published Research: More than 20 published studies have examined the impact of FIMC agency-delivered MTM and MTG services on health outcomes, healthcare savings, and patient satisfaction.
Research In Process: An additional 30 research studies of varying methodologies are currently underway in partnership with FIMC agencies, investigating the impact of MTM and MTG services on priority populations.
FIMC’s new resource Food is Medicine Interventions Lower Costly Healthcare Utilization in States examines evaluations of real-world programs in North Carolina, Massachusetts, and Maryland. Studies found that sustained access to food is medicine interventions leads to lower healthcare utilization and reduced costs over time. The largest cost-savings are seen among the highest-acuity, highest-cost patients, which MTM and MTG programs are explicitly designed for.

The Food is Medicine Coalition (FIMC) is the national coalition of nonprofit organizations that provide medically tailored meals (MTMs) and groceries (MTGs), medical nutrition therapy and nutrition counseling and education to people in communities across the country living with severe, complex and chronic conditions. We advance access to these life-saving interventions through policy change, research and evaluation, and best practices. FIMC agencies created the MTM intervention forty years ago as a response to community need during the HIV epidemic. FIMC offers a community of learning for existing practitioners, equips new organizations to launch medically tailored meal programs, and accredits agencies against our fieldwide standards. FIMC agencies created the medically tailored meal (MTM) intervention forty years ago as a response to community need during the HIV epidemic.

Essential: A Food is Medicine Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

RSS feed quality and score

Publication history

Latest published episodes

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Essential: A Food is Medicine Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

Other9

DOI Foundation3

RSS feed quality and score

Publication history

Latest published episodes

Similar podcasts and content

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Other9

DOI Foundation3