Medically Tailored Meals May Cut Health Costs
By Don Sapatkin, The Philadelphia Inquirer |
It seems like a no-brainer. But the pilot study is thought to be the first to measure actual health-care costs.
The program it examined,
Health insurance generally does not reimburse for such services. One of MANNA's goals in commissioning the study was to present evidence that it should.
The study found an average 28 percent decrease in monthly health-care costs for MANNA clients over their first six months of meals vs. the previous six months. The researchers also compared those clients' billed costs for 12 months after they started getting meals with the costs of a control group, matched for diagnosis and condition, and found a 31 percent saving. Hospital stays were shorter,
and more MANNA clients were discharged directly to home.
"I think the key is that it's not just about food, it's about getting someone better and involved in their care," said
MANNA (
The frozen meals delivered to 850 clients around the region are customized for 11 diets or conditions, with almost limitless combinations, said
Potassium and phosphorus must be restricted for people with kidney disease, for example; they get rice and pasta instead of potatoes.
Chemotherapy messes with taste buds. So cancer patients, now the biggest client group, talk with nutrition staff, who may adjust spices or sourness.
The new study, in the peer-reviewed
The small MANNA group and lack of information on the controls -- nutritional support, extent of regular care -- limit the findings.
It is "circumstantial evidence," said
Though insurers don't reimburse for meals, he said, there is a trend toward paying providers a flat fee to care for their patients. They could contract for medically tailored meals.
Dinger, who was listed as a study coauthor but was not involved with the analysis, hopes the findings will bring funding for a broader study. "We really do fit with where they want to go in health care," she said.
Contact
at 215-854-2617 or [email protected].
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Source: | McClatchy-Tribune Information Services |
Wordcount: | 512 |
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