CURATIVE CUISINE

We’re getting too comfortable with our comfort food. Homemade mac and cheese, fried chicken, and your grandma’s buttermilk biscuits are sentimental Southern favorites for a reason—it’s when those dishes are our only source of nutrition that health problems can arise. No one’s is saying not to indulge in some rocky road when the going gets tough, but USA Health’s Robert Israel, MD, FACP, is here to explain that changing the way we cook and eat will positively impact our lives in ways Ben & Jerry’s can only dream of. What’s more? The teaching kitchen at his practice will train you to make nutritious meals that will aid your overall health without sacrificing flavor.

 By Amber Wielkens Photos Stevye Photography, StevyePhotography.com

 “Last night, I settled in to watch true crime on Netflix while devouring a bag of raw spinach,” said no one ever. And Dr. Israel isn’t suggesting anything as drastic when we speak to him. Indeed, he laughs at the notion. “The first principle we teach is that food needs to be delicious; If it doesn't taste good, then why would anyone but an ascetic eat it? One of my favorite teachers here says he wants his food to be unapologetically delicious and nutritious at the same time, and it is possible,” he affirms. The same goes for encouraging movement and exercise; it needs to be fun or at least pleasant and enjoyable for most people to do it.  

 In over 40 years of practicing medicine, Dr. Israel has seen it all, and learned from it, too. It’s evident he loves his career and his patients. He’s charming, quick-witted, and we immediately feel at ease with him. Spending time with his wife, three children, and four grandchildren brings him joy, and his favorite pastimes are fishing, travel, cooking and eating, hiking, and good literature. An Alabama native, he grew up the son of a small town family doctor, but wasn’t sure he wanted to follow his dad into medicine. He smiles, saying, “I tried hard not to want to be a doctor, but in college I couldn't find anything else I had any aptitude for doing, so I went to medical school, where nutrition wasn’t a big topic. We learned about drugs, medications, and diseases, so I started out like most of my peers 40 years ago, tackling disease and trying to stamp it out. That approach made it difficult to promote health. Back then, health insurance only paid for disease treatment. It wasn’t health insurance at all—it was disease insurance.”

The longer he practiced, the more he became aware of how lifestyle choices affected health outcomes. “What I’ve found is that eight of the top 10 causes of death in the United States are lifestyle-related in one way or another. While we have great medications for all of those diseases, we can’t do it all through medication. We need to do it with lifestyle modification, which includes nutrition, exercise, and other techniques.” he declares.

 Sought after for his diagnostic and treatment skills in the more traditional role of medicine, he was ahead of his time in many ways. “I always thought that integrative approaches to health were much more effective and tried to use those when I could, but I didn’t do it very effectively for many years,” he admits. “Our approach was a negative one—don't do this, don't do that. it wasn’t very appealing and was hard to sell because it was punitive and unpleasant. In retrospect, I wouldn’t have wanted to do what I tried to tell patients they needed to do, either.” 

 While we’re on the subject, we ask what “integrative approach” means. Dr. Israel fills us in. “Integrative medicine utilizes traditional medicine (such as pills, surgery, and physical therapy) and also factors in nutrition, exercise, meditation, massage, mindfulness, and yoga, all applied in an individual way with the patient at the center,” he says. “It’s mind-body-spirit medicine and defines health not as the absence of disease but the best possible state for all three of those areas.” Treating the whole person and not just their disease has revolutionized healthcare, and for good reason—patients are seeing better outcomes for their diseases and improvements in other areas of their life, as well.

 The phrase “food as medicine” wasn’t around until about 20 years ago, which is when Dr. Israel began to see evidence-based studies (with scientific backing) that a more effective approach to healthy lifestyles would benefit patients. He tells us, “I was lucky enough to stumble onto a medical meeting that combined Harvard MDs and scientists and chefs from the Culinary Institute of America where I was exposed to the science and to the great tasting food they were proposing to use as medicine—literally food as medicine. This lightbulb moment changed the way I talked to my patients about their choices and I’ve pursued this approach ever since.”

 Dr. Israel has been the driving force in the USA Health Integrative Health and Wellness Program, which advocates a patient-centered approach to care. His practice houses the teaching kitchen where patients from throughout the USA Health system (and students at the medical school) learn the best foods for their condition and how to cook them so they’re healthy and delicious. He shares, “Culinary medicine is one arm of the integrative approach that uses evidence-based techniques to teach people the necessary skills to plan and prepare delicious and nutritious meals for themselves and their families. A small change from the traditional American diet to a healthier diet (that tastes better anyway) can have very big impacts on health, to the tune of 30% reductions in diabetes, hypertension, cancers, and other illnesses.”

 More proof it works? “We’ve seen many patients turn their pre-diabetes around and their blood sugar return to normal, others have reduced their need for blood pressure medication and other medications, and in addition report an overall improved sense of well-being,” he states.

 When you look up Dr. Israel online, one of the first things you notice is that he’s an internal medicine doctor and a Fellow of the American College of Physicians. The second is that he treats anxiety, depression, and mental illness—not the usual bailiwick of internists. He’s not elbowing in on his psychiatrist colleagues; he’s simply noting what science has proven. “The mind-body connection is real and there is plenty of scientific research telling us that both mood and anxiety improve when diet and lifestyle are improved, particularly reduction in processed food and sugar intake replaced by whole food intake,” he says. It goes without saying (but we will anyway) to consult your doctor if you want to stop taking a medication, but the point remains that making better lifestyle choices will only help you if you wish to do so.

 Help is at hand for those who can’t cook or might need to learn new cooking techniques, those who don’t know what ingredients to buy, and (maybe most importantly) those who want to enjoy eating what they’ve prepared. The USA Health Culinary Medicine Program’s teaching kitchen provides all that and more. A part of the Teaching Kitchen Collaborative (TKC), a prestigious global network of almost 50 teaching kitchens, TKC uses the latest research to guide students in the best way to improve their condition through culinary medicine. And the classes are fun! Our short visit was punctuated with smiles from the friendly and highly trained staff and immediate answers to questions we asked.

 As is true for most things in life, personal experience played a role in Dr. Israel’s passion for healthy and delicious food. “Southerners like a good meal and I’m no different. I like to eat food that tastes good, so it became crucial for me to eat healthy food that I like,” he concludes. “Culinary medicine is a very simple concept. It’s teaching people to eat food that’s healthier than what they’re accustomed to—and also learning it tastes better that way.” Bon appétit!

Robert Israel, MD, FACP | USA Mobile Diagnostic Center—University Commons

75 South University Boulevard, Suite 6500, Mobile

251.660.5787 | USAHealthSystem.com/Providers