For decades, public health researchers have argued that food is medicine. A landmark study published June 2, 2026, in Nature Medicine now provides the most rigorous evidence yet — and the numbers are striking enough to reshape health policy at the state and national level.
Massachusetts Medicaid members who received home-delivered, dietitian-designed meals tailored to their medical conditions had 31% fewer hospitalizations and 20% fewer emergency department visits compared to similar eligible members who did not receive meals. Per-person healthcare costs dropped by $3,433 during the approximately six-month program period — offsetting 98% of the cost of the meals themselves.
"It's rare to find anything in medicine that both improves health and saves money," said senior author Dariush Mozaffarian, MD, DrPH, cardiologist and director of the Food is Medicine Institute at Tufts University's Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy. "Most things in healthcare don't actually save money."
The Study — What Was Measured and How
The study, conducted by researchers at Tufts University, UMass Chan Medical School, Boston-based nonprofit Community Servings, and multiple Massachusetts health systems, is published in Nature Medicine. It is the largest analysis of a statewide Medicaid medically tailored meal program ever conducted.
Researchers analyzed data from 1,866 medically tailored meal recipients and 1,372 comparators — all of whom met eligibility criteria for diet-related conditions and food insecurity — drawn from 11 health systems in Massachusetts between 2020 and 2023. Using propensity overlap-weighted methods to control for differences between groups, they tracked hospitalizations, emergency department visits, primary care visits, and total healthcare costs across a 6-month baseline and the program period.
Medically tailored meals (MTM) differ from standard meal delivery programs. Each meal is designed by a registered dietitian to meet the specific nutritional needs of the recipient's medical conditions — for example, low sodium for heart failure patients, carbohydrate-controlled meals for diabetes, kidney-compatible meals for chronic kidney disease. In this study, meals were delivered by Community Servings and adhered to a national quality standard for medically tailored meals.
| Study Metric | Result |
| Published in | Nature Medicine, June 2, 2026 |
| Participants | 1,866 meal recipients; 1,372 comparators |
| Data source | 11 Massachusetts health systems, 2020–2023 |
| Reduction in hospitalizations | 31% fewer (aIRR = 0.69) |
| Reduction in ED visits | 20% fewer (aIRR = 0.80) |
| Per-person healthcare cost reduction | $3,433 |
| Average program duration | ~6.7 months |
| Weekly meal cost | $125 per person |
| Cost offset percentage | 98% |
| Biggest savings by condition | Heart disease patients: ~$10,000 over 6 months |
| States now expanding MTM in Medicaid | At least 12 |
Who Benefits Most — and What the Conditions Are
The analysis found benefits across multiple conditions, with heart disease patients seeing the largest absolute dollar savings — approximately $10,000 in healthcare cost reductions over the study period. Patients with depression, anxiety, and related conditions also showed measurable benefits from the meal program.
"As the first state to broadly offer medically tailored meals in Medicaid to Americans with diet-related diseases, Massachusetts provided an important opportunity to evaluate the real-world impact of such a program," said Mozaffarian. "Our results show that food really is medicine, with major clinical and policy implications for health-insurance coverage of medically tailored meals to impact diet-related diseases and health care costs."
The eligible population in Massachusetts consists of Medicaid members with diet-related chronic conditions — including diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, chronic kidney disease, and HIV/AIDS — who also have documented food insecurity. These are among the highest-cost, highest-utilization populations in any Medicaid program, which is precisely why the hospitalization reduction carries such significant economic weight.
"Poor nutrition is the top cause of poor health in this country," Mozaffarian has said in prior work. The WBUR report on the study notes that a 2022 analysis projected that if medically tailored meals were broadly implemented, they could help avoid 1.6 million hospitalizations annually and save the U.S. $13.6 billion in healthcare costs per year.
What This Means Nationally — and What States Are Doing
At least a dozen U.S. states are now implementing medically tailored meal programs through Medicaid, according to Tufts University. These states are using Medicaid Section 1115 waivers and other flexibility mechanisms to cover meal programs as a healthcare benefit — a shift made possible in part by growing evidence that food-related interventions can reduce medical costs.
Medicaid serves approximately 71 million Americans who qualify based on income or disability. For many enrollees, food insecurity and poor nutrition are not background conditions but central drivers of the hospitalizations, emergency visits, and medication nonadherence that make their healthcare so costly. Addressing those drivers at the food level — rather than exclusively at the clinic level — is the core principle of the "food is medicine" movement that the Massachusetts study now supports with its most robust data yet.
The accountability question for policymakers is direct: if a $125-per-week meal program reduces per-person healthcare costs by $3,433 over six months — offsetting nearly its own full cost while simultaneously reducing hospitalizations by nearly a third — why is it not a standard Medicaid benefit in every state?
The Medicare program has not yet implemented medically tailored meals at scale, though bipartisan congressional proposals to pilot food-as-medicine programs have been introduced in multiple legislative sessions.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are medically tailored meals?
Medically tailored meals are home-delivered meals individually designed by registered dietitians to meet the specific nutritional needs of a person's medical condition. They differ from standard meal delivery programs because each meal is customized — for example, low-sodium for heart failure, carbohydrate-controlled for diabetes, or kidney-compatible for chronic kidney disease.
What did the Massachusetts Medicaid study find?
Published June 2, 2026 in Nature Medicine, the study found that Medicaid members who received medically tailored meals had 31% fewer hospitalizations and 20% fewer emergency department visits compared to similar members who did not receive meals. Per-person healthcare costs declined by $3,433, offsetting 98% of the program's cost.
Who is eligible for medically tailored meals through Medicaid?
In Massachusetts, eligibility covers Medicaid members with serious diet-related conditions — including heart disease, diabetes, chronic kidney disease, hypertension, and HIV/AIDS — who also have documented food insecurity. Eligibility criteria vary by state.
How much do medically tailored meals cost?
In the Massachusetts program, meals cost approximately $125 per person per week. The study found this was nearly fully offset by reduced healthcare costs — making the program effectively cost-neutral while delivering significant health improvements.
Are medically tailored meals available in my state?
At least a dozen states are now implementing or piloting medically tailored meal programs through Medicaid. Contact your state Medicaid office or ask your primary care provider. National resources include Community Servings and the Food is Medicine Coalition.
