Exercise Is Medicine (EIM) For Community Health

Abstract

PURPOSE: EIM has been an active ACSM initiative since 2007 with an initial focus on including physical activity as a vital sign in the electronic medical record. To do this effectively, EIM needs to determine how to link clinical and community health professionals for patient referral and follow-up using multiple models. METHODS: This presentation highlights the ways in which the nationwide Cooperative Extension System (CES) can be leveraged to bridge the gap between clinics and communities to advance the EIM initiative. History, capacity, and resources associated with the CES will be presented. RESULTS: The CES is a nationwide educational network that brings research and knowledge of land-grant institutions to urban and rural communities in each U.S. state and territory by linking the resources and expertise of 105 land-grant colleges and universities to local communities through USDA’s National Institute for Food and Agriculture (NIFA). CES professionals offer a variety of face-to-face and electronically delivered education programs related to health promotion/disease prevention and also works to change community environments to make them healthier by working to link communities to local resources. The CES’s National Framework for Health and Wellness, released in March 2014, includes strategic priorities related to health promotion and chronic disease prevention and management. The Agriculture Act of 2014 (commonly known as the Farm Bill) included ‘physical activity’ as a component of the largest funded USDA program (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Education Program), demonstrating that the CES, a previously agriculturally centered entity, has embraced physical activity promotion as part of its mission and values. CONCLUSION: While leveraging CES’s trained health educators would improve the reach of EIM, we do not expect most CES professionals would become EIM credentialed professionals. Instead, these professionals could be trained and certified to deliver specific evidence-based or research tested intervention programs (e.g., Better Bones & Balance, Walk With Ease), which include a physical activity component, as a supplementary approach. Health educators may also serve as a liaisons between clinicians and EIM certified health professionals.