LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — When Basim Al Bawe takes his four children to the doctor's office, they get more than just a prescription, a shot or a dose of medical advice. The family carries home an ample supply of groceries.
The items are from a food pantry recently started at the Broadway location of Norton Children's Medical Associates that's helping an estimated one to three families a day avoid hunger.
The pantry is a pilot project between the pediatrics office on East Broadway at Floyd Street and the Dare to Care Food Bank that goes beyond the typical work of doctors and other medical providers to help kids.
This initiative is not "just about treating what is bothering them at the moment," but making sure they remain healthy and that parents aren't stressed out about where their children's next meal will come from, said Dr. Becky Carothers, one of the pediatricians behind the project.
Staff members fill bags for families who have indicated through formal screening they've run out of food in the past 12 months or worry about running out of food without being able to afford more. Recipients are grateful for the food and sometimes even defer to families who might be worse off, Carothers said.
"They're only taking it if they truly need it," she said.
The pantry is in keeping with a national push to get pediatricians involved in fighting food insecurity, which affects millions of households nationwide and is a significant local problem.
"One in six individuals in our community is suffering from food hardships and we know for children, it's one in five," said Annette Ball, programs director for Dare to Care.
The American Academy of Pediatrics issued a policy statement last year encouraging pediatricians to screen children for food insecurity at scheduled health maintenance visits — or sooner — and to familiarize themselves with helpful places to refer families to.
"Pediatricians can play a central role in screening and identifying children at risk for food insecurity and in connecting families with needed community resources," according to the academy. "Pediatricians should also advocate for federal and local policies that support access to adequate healthy food for an active and healthy life for all children and their families."
Although the policy statement from the academy doesn't recommend starting a pantry, the Norton office decided to go that route because "we didn't feel like we had all the resources to help families if they did screen positive" for food insecurity, Carothers said. "Now, we're actually able to do something about it."
Families also receive information about other sites in their area where they can go to get Dare to Care food, Ball said.
In starting the pantry, the Norton office hopes to not only tackle hunger but to prevent potential problems from lack of food. When kids' nutritional needs aren't met, the children can wind up with a host of problems, from illnesses and absenteeism to behavioral and emotional problems, Carothers said.
Dare to Care was interested in the food pantry project because a lot of the people who access Dare to Care food struggle with health conditions, such as diabetes and high blood pressure, Ball said.
"We felt like in partnering with a pediatrician, they would be able to get this food to someone at the moment that they need it . and the pediatrician could tailor the food that they're offering to them based on the conditions of that household," she said.
Al Bawe, an immigrant from Iraq who's lived in this area for more than 5 1/2 years, said having access to the pantry helps his family save money and satisfy his children, who sometimes can be finicky eaters.
"It's a great service to the family," Al Bawe said. "My family is lucky to be in the United States."
The pediatrician's office solicited food donations from Norton Healthcare employees to stock the pantry with an abundance of items. There's an emphasis on products with nutritional pluses, such as being whole grain, low-sugar or low-salt. Besides canned goods, there's oatmeal, dry beans, pasta, spices and other items.
The Norton office also is providing families with recipes as part of an effort to model good nutrition.
As the pantry uses up "food that was given to them by the (Norton) employees, Dare to Care will be there to replenish that for them when they have a need," said Ball, adding that the partnership has been "really great."
Dare to Care hopes that other pediatrics offices in the Louisville area will pick up on the idea and has been talking with the University of Louisville about joining the pilot program with Norton, Ball said.
"If we have great success with this (and) we're able to secure some good funding to back it, then we hope to be able to do this with other pediatric offices," she said.
It's likely that a pantry will be part of the Smoketown Wellness Center that is expected to open next spring in the former Presbyterian Community Center in Sheppard Square, said Dr. Charlotte Gay Stites, a pediatrician working on the project, a few streets away from the Norton office.
The wellness center, which is in the fundraising stage, will include a full spectrum of pediatric care, exercise and after-school programming. It also will have a New Roots Fresh Stop Market to increase access to healthy food, such as produce, by allowing families to pool their resources, she said.
Many children in Smoketown live in poverty, and food access is an issue in the neighborhood, so a pantry would help fulfill their needs, Stites said. "Our goal is really to practice true primary prevention so that families are able to establish healthy lifestyles" and kids can grow up "happy, capable, healthy and well."
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Information from: The Courier-Journal, http://ift.tt/MT604Y
