Food Insecurity Is a Vital Sign: How Family Medicine Addresses Hunger in Our Community
World Hunger Day is May 28, and for a family health clinic, it is a day to acknowledge something that is easy to overlook in clinical practice: hunger is not an issue confined to distant places or emergency headlines. It is present in primary care waiting rooms across Canada, including ours.
Food insecurity affects over four million Canadians. In Ottawa, the Ottawa Food Bank supports more than 50,000 people monthly, and demand has risen sharply in recent years as housing costs and grocery prices strain household budgets. Many of those individuals are patients in family medicine practices, people who come in for diabetes management, blood pressure checks, and sick visits, but who leave with unmet needs that no prescription can address.
At Orleans Family Health Clinic, we believe that addressing food insecurity is part of practicing good medicine. Here is why, and what it looks like in practice.
The Health Consequences of Food Insecurity
Food insecurity is one of the most significant social determinants of health, and the connections to chronic disease are well-established in the medical literature.
Adults in food-insecure households have higher rates of type 2 diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease. Children in food-insecure households show measurable impacts on cognitive development, school performance, and mental health. Depression and anxiety are significantly more prevalent among food-insecure Canadians. Seniors who are food-insecure are at increased risk of functional decline and hospitalization.
These are not incidental associations. Food insecurity drives disease, complicates management, and increases healthcare utilization. A patient who cannot consistently eat nutritious food is a patient whose medications are less likely to work, whose chronic conditions are harder to control, and whose health trajectory is fundamentally different from someone whose basic needs are met.
This is why family medicine cannot address health in isolation from the social and economic context of patients’ lives.
Screening for Food Insecurity in Primary Care: The Hunger Vital Sign
Most primary care visits include measurement of blood pressure, weight, and heart rate. Increasingly, evidence-based family medicine also screens for food insecurity as a vital sign, recognizing it as a clinical indicator with direct bearing on health outcomes.
The Hunger Vital Sign is a validated two-question screening tool used in primary care settings:
“Within the past 12 months, we worried whether our food would run out before we got money to buy more.”
“Within the past 12 months, the food we bought just didn’t last and we didn’t have money to get more.”
A response of “sometimes true” or “often true” to either question is considered a positive screen for food insecurity. The tool is brief, non-invasive, and has been validated across pediatric and adult populations. It identifies patients who may be reluctant to raise food access concerns on their own.
Integrating social determinants of health screening into routine care is part of our commitment to treating the whole patient, not just the presenting complaint.
What Happens After a Positive Screen
Identifying food insecurity is only meaningful if it leads to action. At OFHC, a positive screen opens a conversation and, when appropriate, a referral pathway.
Our physicians and care team can connect patients and families directly to the Ottawa Food Bank, which provides food at no cost and can link people to community food programs in their neighbourhood. No referral is required to access Ottawa Food Bank services, and they are provided without barriers or judgment.
We also work within our integrated care model. Our partner pharmacists at Centrum Pharmacy can review whether any medications require food for safe use, or whether inconsistent nutrition may be affecting how a patient’s drugs are absorbed and metabolized. That kind of coordinated communication matters clinically.
Where appropriate, our team advocates for patients navigating systems access, and documents food insecurity in the medical record so that it informs ongoing care decisions.
The family physician’s continuity is an asset here. Because we know our patients across time, we notice when health is deteriorating in ways that suggest unmet social needs. A patient whose blood sugar control was stable for years and is now erratic may have experienced a change in their household food access. That pattern is something a longitudinal care relationship can detect, where a one-off visit cannot.
Children, Families, and the Ottawa Food Bank
On World Hunger Day, this deserves to be named directly: children are disproportionately represented in food-insecure households in Canada. Approximately 40 percent of Ottawa Food Bank clients are children. Food insecurity in childhood has documented long-term consequences for physical health, cognitive development, and mental wellbeing that extend well into adulthood.
OFHC serves families across every stage of life. When our physicians identify food insecurity in a family with young children, connecting that family to the Ottawa Food Bank and community food programs is not a social work function separate from medicine. It is part of comprehensive family care.
If you or your family are facing food insecurity, you can reach the Ottawa Food Bank directly. No referral is needed, and services are confidential.
Health and Happiness, Hand in Hand for Families
This World Hunger Day, we want our patients and community to know that food insecurity is something you can raise with your family doctor. There is no shame in bringing it up, and there is meaningful support available.
Health and happiness, hand in hand for families.
Visit orleansmedical.ca to book your appointment.
Stay Connected with Orleans Family Health Clinic!
If you found this article helpful, don’t forget to like, share, and Follow to stay up to date on our latest health tips, updates, and wellness advice.
And follow us on social media
Disclaimer: The medical information on this site is provided as an information resource only and is not to be used or relied on for any diagnostic or treatment purposes. This information does not substitute for professional diagnosis and treatment. Please do not initiate, modify, or discontinue any treatment, medication, or supplement solely based on this information. Always seek the advice of your healthcare provider first. Full Disclaimer.
