Food Insecurity is a topic area that is critical in social determinants and is related to economic stability, among the five determinants of health. Dr. Timothy Radak, a registered dietician (link) and I first started discussing about food insecurity in January of 2018 at National Faculty Meeting at Walden University at Tampa, Florida. I have included his most recent presentation on the topic area of diet and the effect on physiology. Dr. Radak shows ways that plant-based or vegan diets are connected to better overall health.
Since then, we have further expanded on understanding food insecurity. Interestingly, one thing to note is that in many definitions of food insecurity, the quality of the food is included. However, when assessing in instruments, this may be emphasized better in the USDA food insecurity module. Here is the only place you can access a full text version of the paper, without a paywall to worry about. There are multiple ways that journals
Beginning of 2020, we had a larger group of collaborators who have been conducting food insecurity research for multiple years and have conclusively shown within the general population and in low-income communities a longitudinal link with poor health outcomes. Findings were published in Health Promotion Practice.
At the end of 2021, amidst the pandemic we were able to present about food insecurity at the American Heart Association. We were able to use NHANES to show longitudinally that food insecurity is connected with cardiovascular mortality and that the presence of diabetes modifies this effect.
Several podcasts and media references have been made since this in order to spread awareness regarding food insecurity.
Continuing now from the article that I started with about food insecurity during the pandemic: As the pandemic unfolded, many people were needing to go to food banks to retrieve supplies. Preliminary geospatial findings show stark geographic difference among individuals who had COVID-19 and those who did not. How food insecurity relates to this idea will be an interesting area of future research. Additionally, we are exploring how food insecurity relates to inflammation.
Below is a preliminary analysis of the initial COVID-19 grant findings. These show how respondents experienced several areas of food insecurity.
Six-Item Short Form of the Food Security Survey Module
For surveys that cannot implement the 18-item or 10-item measures, this "Short Form" six-item scale provides a reasonably reliable substitute. It uses a subset of the standard 18 items. The questions were previously validated and used as the U.S. Household Food Security Survey Module by the USDA.
Part of maintaining overall health is also having proper diet. My colleague Dr. Radak has provided clear link through studies about this in his prevention of disease approach.