What is Food is Medicine?
Food is Medicine (FIM) is a set of food-based interventions (delivered inside the health-care system) that prevent, manage, and treat diet-sensitive conditions and reduce health disparities. It is prescribed and tracked like any other clinical intervention.
Roughly 70% of new type 2 diabetes cases worldwide trace back to inadequate nutrition.
Diet drives the most common, most expensive chronic diseases, yet patients face real barriers: cost, time, distance to healthy food, and confusion about what to eat. Counseling alone rarely closes that gap. FIM puts the food itself inside the care plan.
It treats food as a clinical tool: eligible, prescribed, delivered, measured.
A patient with a diet-sensitive condition and an added risk factor (low income, food insecurity, difficulty with daily activities) becomes eligible for a food intervention sized to their need, and the outcome is tracked like any other therapy.
One framework, four levels of clinical intensity.
From population prevention to medically tailored treatment. FiMCo operates across all of them.
Medically Tailored Meals · MTM
Fully prepared, ready-to-eat meals designed by a Registered Dietitian to a therapeutic diet for a specific clinical condition. No preparation required by the recipient.
Who it's for: Patients with complex diet-sensitive disease and high health-care utilization: post-discharge, advanced chronic disease, high-risk pregnancy.
FiMCo operates condition-specific, RD-designed regimens (renal low-K/low-P, cardiac DASH, ADA-aligned) with islandwide cold-chain delivery.
Medically Tailored Groceries · MTG
A curated set of healthy, condition-appropriate grocery items the patient or caregiver prepares. Distributed as pre-packed boxes, curated lists on a restricted-benefit card, or an online grocery platform.
Who it's for: Patients with diet-sensitive conditions who cook for themselves or their household.
RD-designed condition boxes delivered across all 78 PR municipalities, with member or caregiver preparation and cultural adaptation to Puerto Rican staples.
Produce Prescriptions · PRx
A clinician 'prescribes' fruits and vegetables that the patient redeems at no cost (at a retailer, farmers market, food hub, or online grocery) through a voucher or restricted-benefit card.
Who it's for: Patients with, or at risk for, diet-sensitive chronic disease, tracked to clinical outcomes such as HbA1c and blood pressure.
Nutrisana is the only NAP-authorized islandwide online grocery in PR; the GUSNIP produce-incentive cohort reached a 100% NTAE-confirmed redemption rate.
Nutrition Counseling & Education · Counseling
Medical Nutrition Therapy by a Registered Dietitian, community nutrition education, culturally-adapted recipes and shopping guides, and culinary-medicine instruction that strengthens whatever food intervention is delivered.
Who it's for: Patients and at-risk populations across all tiers, paired with the food benefit, not instead of it.
Bilingual (ES/EN) telenutrition and patient support through the FiMCo call center, with recipe and cultural-adaptation guidance built into each program.
The field's case, and what we observe operating it.
The Food is Medicine framework on this site follows the canonical field model: the same intervention taxonomy, design principles, and payment pathways used across U.S. health care. FiMCo did not invent it; we operate it in Puerto Rico. Framework references: Tufts Food is Medicine Institute · Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy · U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) · American Heart Association (AHA) · CMS Innovation Center (CMMI). FiMCo holds an active Data Use Agreement with the Tufts Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy for outcomes evaluation on the Nutrisana GUSNIP cohort. The framework on this site is one we work inside, not just cite.
The framework, from the people who built the field.
FiMCo operates the canonical Food is Medicine model. We don't own it. These are the primary sources behind the taxonomy, evidence, and funding pathways on this site.
Now turn the framework into a running program.
Map your population to the pyramid, pick a delivery model, and get a program flow scoped to your funding pathway, or talk to us directly.