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  • From: "Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] Farmers Markets Bloom at Hospitals
  • Date: Sat, 20 Jun 2009 15:30:59 -0600


Farmers Markets Bloom at Hospitals
http://www.cornucopia.org/2009/06/farmers-markets-bloom-at-hospitals/#more-1
507
(CNN) — For years, hospitals have embodied a paradox.

As patients are tethered to dialysis machines, and many lay bedridden from
obesity-related diseases, the hospitals’ fast food joints and cafeterias
dispense fried goodies and slick burgers that contributed to such
conditions.

“With fast food establishments, hospitals are sending a message that food
is not important to health,” said Jamie Harvey, a food coordinator of
Health Care Without Harm, a coalition of hospitals and health-related
groups. “But we know that’s wrong. We’re starting to see in a
sweeping way that food is essential to health. Hospitals are adapting to
that message.”

Some hospitals around the country have gone on a diet: Deep fryers have
gone cold, trans fats have been banished, and the glow of the golden arches
(and other fast food symbols) have dimmed as leases have quietly gone
unrenewed.

Instead, these hospitals are offering an alternative food source: farmers
markets.

Patients who’ve been warned to improve their diets can now walk out of
the hospital and find locally grown strawberries, apricots and baby red
potatoes sold on the parking lot. Kaiser Permanente, the nation’s largest
not-for-profit health system, has 30 farmers markets in mostly Western
states like California, Washington and Oregon.

“The focus on local food systems gives us food that’s good for us, good
for our children, good for farmers that grow it and it’s good for the
Earth,” said Dr. Preston Maring, a family physician for 38 years who
brought the concept of farmers markets to Kaiser in 2003.

Having locally grown fruits and vegetables next to a hospital gives people
the visual connection between good food and better health, Maring said.

“It’s clear to me over all these years what people eat is the single
most important determinant of their overall health. It just struck me one
day — why not bring good food to a place where people get their health
care to see if it could become a focal point for education?”

One of the farmers, Roberto Rodriguez, who sells organic strawberries at
the Kaiser Permanente farmers market in Oakland, California, said the
customers say the local goods are “sweeter, fresh and last longer.”

The concept of farmers markets at hospitals is not entirely new, but it has
started to spread — to places like Mount Sinai Medical Center in New
York, University of California San Francisco Medical Center in California,
and the Vanderbilt Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee, which opened its
farmers market in May.

Dr. Lenny Lesser, a member of the policy committee for the National
Physicians Alliance and a family medicine resident at Tufts University,
said the recent wave of farmers markets is promising, but hospitals can do
more.

Lesser worked on a 2006 study that showed 42 percent of 234 U.S. hospitals
sold fast food such as Wendy’s, McDonald’s and Pizza Hut.

“There’s definitely an air of change,” he said. “There has not been
a huge change in terms of brand name fast foods that are still available.
Many hospitals are trying to bring in healthier options, but not
necessarily eliminating the harmful options.”

Indeed, eliminating fast food franchises can be tough.

In one case, the chief executive officer at the Cleveland Clinic, who is
also a heart surgeon, sought to get rid of a McDonald’s franchise inside
the Cleveland, Ohio, medical facility in the early 2000s. But McDonald’s
was halfway through a 20-year lease with the hospital. The parties reached
a compromise that the fast food restaurant would add healthier options on
its menu.

The hospital will not renew the lease with the Big Mac maker when it
expires, said clinic spokeswoman Eileen Sheil. The clinic also opened a
local farmers market last year on its premises.

Locally grown vegetables and fruits are also making their way onto
cafeteria trays for hospital patients, employees and visitors. Instead of a
container of gelatin or a glop of cake — which have inspired photo blogs
dedicated to the wonders of hospital food — patients get an in-season
peach or bowl of strawberries plucked from a nearby farm.

The cafeteria at Fletcher Allen Health Care in Burlington, Vermont, relies
heavily on seasonal, organic produce grown by local farmers. It serves
entrees such as veggie paninis (made of roasted garlic hummus, spinach,
tomatoes, roasted red onion and balsamic drizzle) and whole wheat
flatbreads topped with roasted vegetables and basil pesto. The cafeteria
attracts more than hospital visitors and employees; it has morphed into a
destination spot for the downtown lunch crowd.

Three years ago, Fletcher Allen Health Care started using mostly local
ingredients, such as grass-fed beef and lamb, artisan cheeses, mesclun and
butter lettuce.

Locally grown produce such as lettuce is “fresher, has more crispness to
it,” said Richard Jarmusz, an executive chef at the hospital. “The
flavor is more intense. As food sits and ages, it loses all that flavor.
It’s evaporating. It’s leaving the lettuce. Some things have been
sitting a week before you get it. The stuff you get locally are picked that
morning.”

Jarmusz was the executive chef for ski resorts and restaurants before he
came to the hospital.

“When I first came to health care, you could see they needed help in the
quality of the food because of the bulk,” Jarmusz said. “Here we are at
a health care facility [yet] we are preparing fried foods. After somebody
sees a cardiac doctor who tells them their cholesterol is too high, he
stops at a cafeteria and gets French fries. The message is mixed. Now
we’re delivering the appropriate message.”




  • [Livingontheland] Farmers Markets Bloom at Hospitals, Tradingpost, 06/20/2009

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