Lifestyle Medicine Insider
July 2019 | Third Edition
ADVOCACY | MEDIA | EDUCATION | RESEARCH | ECONOMICS | COMMUNITY
Lifestyle Medicine Insider , a periodic look into the political, industry and economic environment we face as Lifestyle Medicine pioneers.
ACLM President Dexter Shurney, MD, MBA, MPH priorities:

  • Policy
  • Payment
  • Partnerships
  • Public Relations
ECONOMICS
  • Lifestyle Medicine is included in the new PricewaterhouseCoopers annual report on costs: PwC "Behind the Numbers 2020" report. Note the statistics and graphics, and especially the quote from ACLM President Dexter Shurney, MD, MBA, MPH, FACLM, DipABLM, as well as the highlight of our members at Lee Health in Florida.
ACLM IN THE "HOUSE OF MEDICINE"
  • ACLM President Dexter Shurney and Ardmore Institute of Health President and CEO Ron Stout are new members of the AMA’s Preventive Medicine Section Council representing ACLM and Lifestyle Medicine.
  • ACLM members Corey Howard, MD, of Florida, who currently is a member of ACLM’s Clinical Practice Management Working Group, ran for vice speaker of the AMA House of Delegates and Michael Suk, MD, JD, MPH, MBA, FACS, of Pennsylvania, ran for the Board of Trustees. Dr. Suk, who is Chief Physician Officer, Geisinger System Services, was elected. https://www.ama-assn.org/house-delegates/ama-elections/2019-ama-elections
  • In her inauguration address, incoming AMA President Patrice Harris highlighted the fact that one in two American adults struggles with chronic conditions such as diabetes and heart disease and the rising cost of pharmaceuticals.
ADVOCACY
  • ACLM President Dexter Shurney, Executive Director Susan Benigas and other representatives are headed to Washington, DC, July 15-17 to hold ACLM’s first advocacy meetings with key targeted Congressional offices and agencies. The group will be introducing ACLM and Lifestyle Medicine and discussing reimbursement barriers, quality measure disincentives, and Lifestyle Medicine in insulin resistance and Type 2 diabetes treatment and reversal.
  • ACLM commented on the Senate's Lower Health Care Costs Act of 2019, and we are drafting comments on CMS’ new RFI called Patients over Paperwork."
  • ACLM was approved to present oral comments at the upcoming second public meeting of the FDA’s 2020 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee on July 11 in Washington. Our topic? The evidence that a plant-predominant dietary lifestyle can treat and reverse chronic illnesses such as Type 2 diabetes. Dr. John Kelly will represent ACLM.
  • We responded to a recent Forbes article on the need for innovation in health care reform: See the response on LinkedIN
  • ACLM leadership is in early discussions with the CMS Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation (CMMI), introducing the organization and Lifestyle Medicine to CMMI's chief medical director and other key members of the CMMI team.
  • The White House’s newly announced executive order “Improving Price and Quality Transparency in Healthcare” may mean opportunities related to Lifestyle Medicine practice and reimbursement. Among other things the order: Directs the Administration to develop a quality “road map” to improve and consolidate quality metrics across federal health care programs; directs the Administration to open up access to claims data (that has been de-identified for patient protection) to allow for the development of tools and analytics; and directs the Department of the Treasury to open up more health savings account (HSA) options by expanding the types of services for which HSAs can be used.
MEDIA
LM HITS THE BIG SCREEN
Lifestyle Medicine is the topic of the recently launched film Code Blue and the upcoming release of The Game Changers . Both films prominently feature ACLM members and Lifestyle Medicine experts: Drs. David Katz, Scott Stoll, Dean Ornish, Saray Stancic, Jennifer Trilk, James Loomis and many more! You can find out   more about Code Blue here , or  learn about the world premiere of The Game Changers here
HAPPY AND HEALTHY
  • Two years ago, ACLM Past-president Liana Lianov, MD, MPH, FACLM, established the Liana Lianov Fund for Happiness Science within ACLM, and her initial contribution, doubled through a matching grant campaign, was used in part to produce the inaugural Summit on Happiness Science in Health Care, co-sponsored by Dell Medical School and hosted in April 2018 on the University of Texas Austin campus. The by-invitation-only, "think- tank" event resulted in this groundbreaking paper: Positive Psychology in Lifestyle Medicine and Health Care: Strategies for Implementation. Dr. Lianov will soon publish a book on the subject, and efforts are underway to produce an online course and workshop series addressing the vital topic of physician well-being. This, and much more, is being done as part of ACLM’s Happiness Science and Positive Health Committee and companion Member Interest Group that Dr. Lianov chairs. To lean more, contact Liana at [email protected]. 
  • Replace meds with exercise prescriptions for mental health and happiness? This study says yes.
RESEARCH
  • A new case study found that plant-based diets may lead to a remission in Crohn’s disease.
CORPORATE ROUNDTABLE
  • Data from ACLM Corporate Roundtable member Wellsource shows how lifestyle choices impact happiness both positively and negatively, offering the opportunity for intervention that improves mental and physical health of targeted populations.
  • ACLM Corporate Roundtable member Better Therapeutics has announced the deployment of digital cognitive behavioral therapy in its prescription digital therapeutic for treating adults with type 2 diabetes. The aim is to isolate and shift the underlying thoughts and beliefs that contribute to poor diet and lifestyle behaviors.
LM IN COMMUNITIES
  • As the result of Midland Health’s Lifestyle Medicine programs and other community health efforts, Midland County has moved up to the 29th healthiest county in Texas out of 254, according to this year’s County Health Rankings from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The 2018 report had Midland County in the No. 42 spot. The rankings are based on length of life and quality of life.
  • Midland Health’s Lifestyle Medicine Center was opened in 2017, and the organization is the first health system in the nation to join the ACLM Corporate Roundtable.
  • The organization’s commitment to Lifestyle Medicine was captured in this video.
  • Midland Health's work was recently featured in the media.
FINAL WORD
  • Perhaps this chart on pediatric biometrics from the Journal of the American College of Cardiology and highlighted on Twitter by ACLM member Koushik Reddy, MD (who marked the 20% point), should be run in every parent magazine across this country.