UNMC joins federal push for more nutrition education in medical school

The University of Nebraska Medical Center is one of 53 institutions to sign on to a federal effort pushing for more nutrition education in medical school curricula.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is looking for medical education institutions to commit to at least 40 hours of required nutrition education for students. There’s also an option for campuses to focus more on outcomes than time with a competency equivalent.

The federal health department created a framework including 71 competencies, or outcomes. It was created using a 2024 consensus paper from the Journal of the American Medical Association and recommendations from experts at HHS, according to the framework.

University of Nebraska President Jeffrey Gold said it made sense for the UNMC campus to sign on because university leaders have already done work to bring more evidence-based nutrition education into classes.

“It's been very deeply integrated into curriculum for a very long time, but not standardized across all of medical education and not necessarily competency-based,” Gold said.

Gold recalled his time as a medical student learning about pediatric nutrition, liver disease and hypertension, among other topics.

Dr. Geoffrey Talmon, senior associate dean for medical education at UNMC, said students started the push for more nutrition education in 2019.

“We'd always done it, but it was something that they had identified as something they wanted to include more within their training,” Talmon said.

The campus formed a task force with physicians from multiple specialities, scientists and people from across campus. Talmon said they’ve spent the past few years integrating more nutrition education in the pre-clinical curriculum, which is classroom-based lessons.

Now, the campus is looking to expand nutrition education in clinical phases and assessments. Talmon gave the example of a student in a family medicine clinic having the ability to include nutrition in their assessment of a patient and make recommendations about nutrition for that patient's needs.

“It's hopefully going to be woven into bits and pieces so it becomes part of the DNA of the curriculum that they're receiving,” Talmon said.

Gold said nutritional issues are impacting people across Nebraska, making it an important focus for medical students.

“The ultimate goal of this is to continue to enhance the health of the state of Nebraska, and this is hopefully yet another tool in the tool chest to do that,” Gold said.

Talmon said while it’s important to manage nutrition, it also plays a vital role in preventing other diseases like heart failure.

“This is another dimension of the health of a patient that not only helps prevent disease and helps patients live better lives, more healthy lives, but also helps with the treatment of conditions when they develop with proper nutrition,” Talmon said. “It comes back to what our ultimate goal is as physicians is to make our patients the healthiest they can be.”