Dr. Patel is a pioneer for her development of innovative care delivery models that utilize lifestyle medicine to treat, in some cases reverse and prevent chronic disease. She has led the highly successful delivery of lifestyle medicine-based Intensive Therapeutic Lifestyle Change (ITLC) programs in both in-person and virtual settings and advocated passionately for lifestyle medicine integration within health systems. Her efforts to integrate lifestyle medicine into employee health have resulted in significant cost savings.
She assumes the presidency during the 20th year anniversary of ACLM, a time of rapid growth and momentum for the organization and the field of lifestyle medicine.
“The traditional health care delivery model has failed to address the U.S. crisis of chronic disease and its associated costs,” Dr. Patel said. “As a result, policymakers, health leaders and health systems are recognizing the exceptional value of the patient-centered, whole-person approach that puts lifestyle medicine at the foundation of health and healthcare with the clinical goal of restoring health rather than simply managing symptoms. Lifestyle medicine is a viable, sustainable solution to today’s ‘sick care’ system’s problems. I am honored to lead an organization whose members are restoring their patients’ health.”
ACLM is the nation’s only medical professional association representing the interdisciplinary field of lifestyle medicine. Lifestyle medicine uses therapeutic lifestyle interventions as a primary modality to treat chronic conditions including, but not limited to, cardiovascular diseases, type 2 diabetes, and obesity. Lifestyle medicine certified clinicians are trained to apply evidence-based, whole-person, prescriptive lifestyle change to treat and, when used intensively, often reverse such conditions. Applying the six pillars of lifestyle medicine—a whole-food, plant-predominant eating pattern, physical activity, restorative sleep, stress management, positive social connections, and avoidance of risky substances—also provides effective prevention for these conditions.
During her 20-year career as an internal medicine physician, Dr. Patel has served as system medical director of lifestyle medicine and southwest regional medical director at Wellvana Health. She also served as medical director of the Lifestyle Medicine Center at Midland Health, where she led the Ornish Program for Reversing Heart Disease and Pritikin Cardiac Rehabilitation, and created a physician office-based intensive cardiac rehabilitation program.
In addition to her role as ACLM president, Dr. Patel is vice president of the World Lifestyle Medicine Organization; vice president of Midland Quality Alliance, a clinically integrated network of physicians; chair of ACLM’s Clinical Practice and Quality Committee; and a member of the Endorsement and Maintenance Committee for Partnership for Quality Measurement. She serves on the National Quality Forum’s (NQF) Healthcare Professional Stakeholder Advisory Council and was a member of the NQF’s 2021-2023 Leadership Consortium. She is a consultant for the Texas Medical Board’s Committee on Alternative Payment Models and also a co-founder of Healthy City, a non-profit organization aimed at raising awareness of the benefits of plant-based nutrition within her community.
About ACLM®
Serving as a transformation catalyst, disruptor of the status quo, and a galvanized force for change, the American College of Lifestyle Medicine is the nation’s medical professional society advancing the field of lifestyle medicine as the foundation of a redesigned, value-based and equitable healthcare delivery system, essential to achieving the Quintuple Aim and whole person health. ACLM represents, advocates for, trains, certifies, and equips its members to identify and eradicate the root cause of chronic disease by optimizing modifiable risk factors. ACLM is filling the gaping void of lifestyle medicine—including food as medicine—in medical education, doing so across the entire medical education continuum, while also advancing research, clinical practice and reimbursement strategies. Adding years to lives and life to years, while reining in the alarming, unsustainable trajectory of healthcare spending, is what lifestyle medicine delivers.
Media Contact
Alex Branch, Director of Communications, American College of Lifestyle Medicine, American College of Lifestyle Medicine, 9719835383, [email protected], American College of Lifestyle Medicine
SOURCE American College of Lifestyle Medicine
