Creating Vidant Health's Healthy Food Environment

The Vidant Health Wellness team, registered dietitians, and food service operators have played a leadership role in defining healthy food environments for hospitals. Without the benefit of national guidelines, we responded to the call for a healthier eating environment in 2003, and it has evolved to meet the documented health needs of the employees and visitors of its entire health care system. Vidant Health has successfully implemented both environmental and policy changes. In 2012, Vidant Health adopted a corporate policy that requires 75% of the foods and beverages sold in hospital eateries and vending machines and 60% of items provided by caterers and/or purchased with Vidant Health funds meet healthy criteria, be labeled at the point of service, and be priced to encourage purchase. This policy retains customer choice compared with policies that ban food fryers, sugar-sweetened beverages, or other high calorie foods and beverages.