# The Role of Medically Tailored Groceries in Mitigating Food Insecurity and Improving Pregnancy Outcomes through Clinic-Community Partnerships

> **NIH NIH R01** · CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY · 2024 · $728,263

## Abstract

ABSTRACT
Medically tailored groceries (MTG) generally involve fresh and shelf-stable grocery items to be
prepared at home, selected by a nutritional professional based on a treatment plan and are typically
picked up at a clinic, market, or pantry. This clinic-based market or pantry model (CB-MTG) is a
growing approach adopted by health care systems in their effort to address food insecurity in their
patient population, including University Hospitals of Cleveland (UH) and MetroHealth Medical
Center (Metro), two of the three largest health systems in Cleveland, Ohio. Often offered to patients
with food-related chronic conditions, CB-MTGs have shown to improve medication adherence,
increase fruits and vegetable consumption and decrease HbA1c in people with diabetes. However,
less evidence is available on the impact of CB-MTGs with food insecure pregnant individuals, where
food insecurity has been strongly associated with prematurity and other negative birth outcomes.
While promising, the CB-MTG approach requires transportation, having the tools and equipment to
prepare meals at home and some basic food preparation skills, all potential barriers for low-income
pregnant individuals, especially younger parents-to-be or those already with children. The Greater
Cleveland Food Bank and partners, seeking to address these barriers, recently developed a home
delivered version of MTG (HD-MTG), offered to Medicaid-eligible pregnant individuals across the
county, with promising results. We seek to integrate these approaches into patient care for food
insecure, pregnant women and test the effectiveness of these two approaches, alongside an
additional intervention arm that adds supplemental nutrition and culinary education and support
to the home-delivered approach (HD-MTG PLUS). These three approaches will be offered (via
randomization) to 360 pregnant individuals (120 per arm) with food insecurity who are patients
within UH and Metro’s largest urban obstetric practices, each with direct EHR referral systems to
their “food as medicine” clinics/markets. Data are collected at baseline, near/at delivery and 6
months post-delivery. This study seeks to understand the unique contribution of each approach, as
well as implementation and intervention uptake barriers, with the goal of building the evidence
base of MTG interventions and making recommendations to providers and health systems seeking
to address food insecurity and nutrient de�iciencies during pregnancy.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 11059690
- **Project number:** 1R01NR021490-01
- **Recipient organization:** CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** ELAINE A. BORAWSKI
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $728,263
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2024-09-10 → 2029-05-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/11059690

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 11059690, The Role of Medically Tailored Groceries in Mitigating Food Insecurity and Improving Pregnancy Outcomes through Clinic-Community Partnerships (1R01NR021490-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/11059690. Licensed CC0.

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