healthy food first

Conditions: Hypertension; Food Insecurity; Diet, Mediterranean

Summary: socioeconomic barriers to healthy eating, particularly food insecurity, are a major reason for poor blood pressure control and hypertension complications. healthy diet patterns have been shown to improve health. unfortunately, food insecurity makes it difficult for individuals to maintain healthy diet patterns. this pragmatic randomized trial will compare two food insecurity interventions (a healthy food subsidy versus a delivered food box), with or without lifestyle support delivered by community health workers, for 6 versus 12 months duration. key outcomes include blood pressure, food insecurity, and other patient reported outcomes.

socioeconomic barriers to healthy eating, particularly food insecurity ("insufficient or uncertain access to enough food for an active, healthy life") are a major reason for poor blood pressure control, and hypertension complications. healthful dietary patterns, such as a mediterranean (med)-style diet, improve blood pressure control and reduce cardiovascular risk, risk for other chronic diseases, and premature mortality. however, food insecurity incentivizes individuals away from healthful diet patterns, resulting in wide disparities in diet-related diseases such as hypertension. though two major ways to address food insecurity are commonly proposed-- providing subsidies for healthy food and home delivery of healthy food boxes--investigators do not know which will have the greater effect. further, as these interventions cannot be provided indefinitely, investigators need to determine whether adding an intervention to support healthy lifestyle change, such as a culturally-tailored med-style diet intervention, can lead to improved health even after provision of the food insecurity intervention ends. thus, the study team proposes to conduct 2x2x2 factorial design randomized trial to compare two food insecurity interventions, with or without a lifestyle support intervention that provides culturally tailored med-style dietary pattern education, disease self-management support, and navigation to community resources for health related social needs, over 2 different time periods. to realize the vision of "food as medicine" to promote equity in clinical care, the study team has drawn on an extensive background of previously tested programs to create the novel multi-component interventions that will be tested in this trial. this novel intervention focuses on lowering blood pressure and addressing food insecurity. specifically, participants will be separately randomized to receive 1) a food subsidy versus home delivery of a healthy food box, and 2) a structured lifestyle support intervention, delivered by community health workers and supervised by a registered dietitian versus usual care for 3) either 6 or 12 months. the proposed study will be conducted in central nc, enrolling 1400 participants with a history of hypertension and food insecurity. six months after the end of each participant's intervention, investigators will re-assess study outcomes to evaluate for sustained effects.

Eligibility criteria:
inclusion criteria: * diagnosis of hypertension with systolic blood pressure \> 130 mm hg * report of food insecurity by 2-item 'hunger vital sign' * english or spanish speaking * age ≥ 18 years * lives within delivery area of intervention services. exclusion criteria: * pregnancy * malignancy * advanced kidney disease (estimated creatinine clearance \< 30 ml/min assessed by chronic kidney disease epidemiology collaboration formula)