O6 Meals on Wings: A Food Recovery Meal Program to Improve the Nutritional Health and Well-Being of Seniors

Background:

For the older adult, maintenance of good nutritional health is essential to functioning, the prevention or management of chronic disease, and quality of life. Compounding this problem is the increasing numbers of seniors that are food insecure. Studies show approximately half of community-dwelling elders are at nutrition risk which leads to increased risk for additional health problems, functional decline, reduced quality of life and hospitalization. The Meals on Wings program offers a solution for some of those seniors in need by recovering unused food that would normally be wasted from area hospitals and repackaging it into healthful meals. The meals are delivered to home-bound seniors using student volunteers to recover food, prepare the meals and deliver to the seniors. This program not only fights hunger in the community but also helps decrease food waste.