CHOP Program Tackles Food Insecurity

Posted by WHYY on December 10, 2024

A Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) program showed promising results for families facing food insecurity. Researchers hope more funding broadens its reach. The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia found nearly one in five patient families struggle to get enough food, and wanted to address it.

The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia recently took its goal of keeping children healthy one step further with a pilot program that delivered groceries and meals to patients and their families who struggle with food insecurity.

In the United States, more than 10% of families with children struggle to get enough food, according to 2022 statistics from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. CHOP found that among the families of their patients, around one in five struggle with food insecurity, according to a 2019 survey.

This, of course, impacts patients’ health, said Dr. Aditi Vasan, a pediatrician and researcher at CHOP. “When we think about the scope of factors that affect a child and a family’s health, we know that very few of them are things that happen inside the walls of a hospital or clinic, and much more of it has to do with the environments that they go home to,” she said.

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