Program Overview
The goal of the Culinary and Lifestyle Medicine Track program is to increase the number of physicians who have an understanding, appreciation and skill development in nutrition, food science and preparation and lifestyle management issues to be able to educate patients in those personal behaviors that would lessen the risk of chronic diseases. The Culinary and Lifestyle Medicine Track is an interdisciplinary program with faculty and students from the School of Medicine and the Davis College of Agriculture, Natural Resources Division of Animal and Nutritional Sciences.
Looking at the top causes of death in the United States according to the CDC, most of those causes can be mitigated by adherence to better lifestyle choices in food, exercise, stress reduction and restorative sleep. These conditions can be prevented, improved or even reversed by proper lifestyle management.
Regardless of which medical specialty the medical student decides to pursue, by studying and learning information in lifestyle management, they can hopefully lessen the impact of these chronic diseases as a practicing resident and physician in the future.
What can CLMT do for students?
Completion of this curriculum will give medical students:
- An enhanced level of training in culinary and lifestyle medicine concepts. Many courses that students take while in medical school focus on disease states and their treatments. Moving forward, it is our hope that many chronic disease states can be prevented or reversed with proper lifestyle modifications. No matter the specialty that students may choose, we know that information learned in this curriculum will assist future physicians in caring for their patients.
- An opportunity to participate in interdisciplinary learning communities and see the interconnection of various healthcare professionals as participants in wellness.
- A chance to enjoy meeting with leaders from prospective future communities and participate in community research opportunities
What can CLMT do for West Virginia?
We are dedicated to training students who will help West Virginians lead healthier lives. Much of West Virginia's population deal with chronic diseases that could be mitigated by healthy dietary habits, sleep, physical activity and mental wellness. By creating working relationships with healthcare professionals who value healthy habits, medical students and physicians will be able to assist West Virginians in improving their health in all aspects of their lives.
Program Aims
- Enable medical students to gain comfort in "prescribing wellness"
- Create physicians who recognize the value of self-care
- Offer students the opportunity to participate in community research and engagement
Our Team
The Culinary and Lifestyle Medicine Track has core faculty and staff who provide direct oversight for the program, including such tasks as creation and management of curricular content, precepting clinical rotations and monitoring student progress. Core faculty include Rosie Lorenzetti, M.D., and Madison Humerick, M.D., from the School of Medicine Eastern Campus. They are the co-directors and creators of the track. Both have their Certified Culinary Medicine Specialist (CCMS) certifications, are family physicians and work in the WVU Center for Diabetes and Metabolic Health located in Martinsburg. Melody Phillips, M.D., has her CCMS certification, is also a family physician and is board-certified in lifestyle medicine. She is the lead faculty on the Morgantown Campus. Michelle Alder is the program manager of the track - keeping all of us doctors on target.
There are multiple supporting faculty members from several disciplines who are partners in the education of students enrolled in the track on all campuses.
On the Eastern Campus, there are several physicians in the Center for Diabetes and Metabolic Health whose interests include treatment and reversal of type 2 diabetes with nutrition therapy. There is also psychologist Jonathan Deiches, Ph.D., whose special interest is helping people with disordered eating patterns and psychiatrist Raja Mogallapu, M.D., who is board-certified in obesity medicine and studies the link between obesity and depression.
On the Morgantown campus, there is Laura Davisson, M.D., an internist and physician who is board-certified in obesity medicine and works with some of the students on elective rotations and nutritional projects through the bariatric clinic. Vascular surgeon Samantha Minc, M.D., MPH, FACS, has an interest in nutrition therapy as an additional treatment of peripheral vascular diseases due to diabetes. She is one of the fourth-year clinical preceptors and has sponsored and mentored CLMT students in the INTRO research program each summer since 2022. Exercise physiologist David Donley, M.S. partners with the Culinary Track in some of the physical activity educational modules. Annette “Nettie” Freshour, M.S., is the Director of the Dietetics Internship Program at WVU, and her dietician graduate students have been partnering with us and the CLMT students in the teaching kitchens located in the Agricultural Sciences Building.
On the WVU Charleston Campus and in the southern part of the state, we have three people who serve as mentors for elective rotations, research projects or community service activities. At Charleston Area Medical Center there is Youmna Mousattat, M.D., a pediatrician interested in improving the lifestyles of children and families. Recently, Andy Vaughan, M.D., MBA, a Huntington, WV cardiologist who is also CCMS certified and has a special interest in culinary medicine and heart disease prevention, has joined the team. This is a multi-disciplined support faculty and we are always welcoming new faces to the field.