How ACLM members are promoting lifestyle medicine at the state level 

Members have written articles for newsletters, initiated education projects, sought leadership positions and helped the adoption of policies and directives supporting lifestyle medicine in state medical associations and societies nationwide.

Interest in the use of lifestyle medicine to treat the root causes of chronic disease is rapidly growing in state and regional medical associations nationwide. One reason for that is the determined work of American College of Lifestyle Medicine (ACLM) members who have taken the initiative to engage with these organizations to advance lifestyle medicine education and its incorporation into clinical practice. 

Members have leveraged ACLM resources and networking opportunities to write articles for newsletters and journals, led lifestyle medicine education projects, sought leadership positions and initiated efforts to adopt policies and directives supporting lifestyle medicine in state medical organizations. 

“We call ACLM a galvanized force for change because our more than 13,000 members were drawn together by a shared passion for a redesigned healthcare system with a clinical goal of restoring health,” ACLM CEO Susan Benigas said. “Our membership is truly the lifeblood of our organization, and we applaud every member who is taking steps, both big and small, to make our shared vision a reality.” 

Here are four examples of ACLM members initiating change through state medical professional organizations.  

Addressing chronic disease in Kentucky  

ACLM member Evelyn Montgomery Jones, MD, was elected president of the Kentucky Medical Association (KMA) in 2023. She immediately made a priority of improving the health of Kentuckians, noting that 80% of chronic disease and 40% of cancers were directly linked to lifestyle choices. Dr. Jones in August issued an innovative challenge to KMA’s 7,000 members to complete ACLM’s complimentary 5.5-hour CME “Lifestyle Medicine and Food as Medicine Essentials” course. 

For incentives, KMA and ACLM entered individuals who completed the course into a drawing for complimentary virtual registrations to ACLM’s 2024 annual conference, as well as free registrations for ACLM’s “Foundations of Lifestyle Medicine Board Review” course and “Remission of Type 2 Diabetes and Reversal of Insulin Resistance with Lifestyle Medicine” course. KMA has already announced prizes for two physicians and continues to promote interest in the Essentials course.  

“I’m excited to be able to offer this opportunity from ACLM to KMA physicians, especially as we look for ways to improve the health status of our patients and our state,” Dr. Montgomery Jones said.  

New policies and directives in Massachusetts  

In July, the Massachusetts Medical Society (MMS) announced the adoption of policies and directives closely aligned with lifestyle medicine. They included the importance of educating physicians and the public about the health and climate benefits of a whole-food, plant-predominant eating pattern, and making such an eating pattern more equitably accessible and affordable. 

ACLM and MMS member Janet Limke, MD, DipABLM, prepared the resolutions for debate in the MMS House of Delegates. The process of drafting, submitting and gaining approval of resolutions is no simple task. Proposed resolutions are published online, comments are solicited and each MMS member, district, caucus and committee can suggest changes or advise whether to adopt or not adopt the proposed policy.  

“Each resolution contains supportive background and research and is expanded and refined along the way,” Dr. Limke said. “I got a lot of feedback first by sharing them with many members I knew who follow a plant-based dietary pattern or are interested in the environment before I submitted them to the entire House of Delegates.” 

She also shared working versions of the resolutions with resident physicians and fellows involved with MSS and was pleased by how many engaged. The enthusiasm of the next generation of doctors inspired her, she said.  

Her advice? “Get involved in your state medical organizations and connect with colleagues from diverse settings,” Dr. Limke said. “Engaging with other colleagues in advocacy efforts to improve the health system is one of many solutions proposed to reduce physician burnout.”  

Treating pediatric obesity in South Carolina 

Blakely Amati, MD, FAAP, DipABLM, and Erin Brackbill, MD, FAAP, DipABLM, are working tirelessly to teach physicians how to address pediatric obesity with lifestyle medicine in South Carolina.  

They started growing interest in lifestyle medicine in 2021 by leading a quality improvement project through the South Carolina Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics (SCAAP) and the state quality improvement collaborative Quality Through Technology and Innovation in Pediatrics (QTIP). The project focused on incorporating a lifestyle medicine approach to pediatric obesity within pediatric primary care medical homes.  

As part of the project, participants curated food resources and child-friendly healthy recipes for patients and adjusted patient visit templates to address healthy eating and active living. The project’s positive feedback helped inform the creation of ACLM’s toolkit Beyond the Numbers: A Lifestyle Medicine Approach to Pediatric Obesity, which provides guidance for the evaluation and management of school-aged children and adolescents with overweight and obesity.  

The project’s success led them to create the SCAAP Healthy Lifestyles Subcommittee that is cohosting a learning collaborative involving pediatric obesity, motivational interviewing and applying the six pillars of lifestyle medicine.  

“We have been met with so much enthusiasm from pediatricians looking for new ways to engage with their patients and their community around healthy lifestyle practices,” Dr. Amati said. “It’s been amazing to see the continued interest after the QI workshops ended, the different way providers have incorporated lifestyle medicine principles into their practice, and to see colleagues going on to pursue lifestyle medicine certification themselves.” 

Promoting plant-predominant eating in Indiana 

Throughout her career, Joanne Evans, MEd, RN, PMHCNS-BC, has used the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine’s  21-day Kickstart Program to promote whole-food, plant-predominant eating patterns for community groups. As the result of her free service, some participants have reported lowering their cholesterol by up to 59 points, while others lost weight and reported improvements in energy and sleep. 

After moving to Indiana, she learned that the Indiana Nurses Association (INA) was soliciting project proposals for 2021 and approached INA leadership about offering her program to members. She led a 90-minute presentation, followed by two or three webinars and blood work, when possible, for nurse participants.  

Positive participant feedback earned Evans an invitation to write an article about the evidence supporting the health benefits of plant-based eating pattern and educational resources for the association’s newsletter, the “Indiana Nurse Association Bulletin.” That gave her an idea: why not tweak the article into different versions and submit it to other state nurse associations nationwide? 

After reaching out to contacts at the American Nurses Association and members from other states in ACLM’s Registered Nurse/Advanced Practice RN Member Interest Group (MIG), she was able to place her article in nursing newsletters in more than 20 other states.  

“I have found that it is important to acknowledge that changing lifestyle behaviors, whether that is how you eat, move or sleep, is not easy,” Dr. Amati said. “Be passionate but not a zealot because that turns people off. That helps with networking and building support for what you hope to accomplish.”  

Join ACLM for access to an array of member benefits and ACLM Connect, a community resource hub where you can connect with other members, engage at ACLM events, collaborate on projects and find shared resources to help you advocate at a state level.