Shopping for Health

Post written by CHC member Casey Strickler

Casey is a serving as a Health Educator at Erie Family Health Center in Humboldt Park

Diet and nutrition are some of the most important yet challenging aspects of our health. However, a healthy diet is vital to preventing or controlling diabetes. However, for anyone who has tried to break or change a habit, changing a diet can be one of the most difficult aspects of life to change. To help facilitate this change, I lead the program Shopping Matters at Erie Family Health Center in Humboldt Park. This program brings individuals to grocery stores to help them understand easy ways to make healthy decisions while shopping. At the end of this 2-hour program, we give participants $10 to spend at the store to test their new knowledge.

Most Erie Humboldt Park patients are best served in Spanish and have moved to the U.S. from other countries. This creates a challenge when navigating grocery stores and managing diet and nutrition. In their home countries, patients may have had access to space for a garden, but when switching to U.S. food sources, patients begin to replace their natural vegetable garden with processed sodium-infused fast or frozen foods.

Those recently diagnosed with diabetes often report that they have never read a food label before in their life and are on a tight budget when shopping for food. During Shopping Matters, we aim to address both the nutrition and financial challenges. We discuss with participants how to buy fruits and vegetables in season, so they can save money while still getting 5 servings of vegetables and fruits every day. We also explain that participants should only buy bread or tortillas where the very first ingredient is “whole grains” in order to get all the nutrients one’s body needs. In the dairy aisle, we compare low fat cheeses and milks, showing participants that skim milk, unflavored almond milk, or unflavored soy milk are the best options to avoid high levels of fat and maintain low amounts of sugar.  Similarly, knowing to buy beans without added salt, or unflavored yogurt to avoid high levels of sugar are all vital steps to both prevent and manage diagnoses like diabetes or hypertension. Thanks to programs like Shopping Matters, we can help patients change their habits and navigate more healthy choices.

 For more information on the health programs Erie Family Health has to offer click here.