At Stony Brook Southampton’s Chancellors Hall, 82-year-old Hampton Bays resident Ann Coppola sought guidance on nutrition and healthy aging during the Food as Medicine Symposium on September 25. Hosted by The FoodLab, the morning event gathered clinicians, researchers, and community members to examine how daily dietary patterns, physical activity, and social connections influence long-term health outcomes.
In Plain English: The Clinical Takeaway
- Health Span Focus: Experts at the symposium emphasized extending “health span”—the portion of life people can spend healthy, active and independent—rather than focusing solely on lifespan.
- Lifestyle Synergy: Clinical lifestyle medicine demonstrates that everyday habits like plant-forward eating, consistent physical activity, restorative sleep, and community engagement operate through interconnected biological pathways.
- Preserving Autonomy: Institutional nutrition programs are shifting toward dining models that prioritize patient choice, culinary pleasure, and social interaction.
Bridging Community Tradition and Lifestyle Medicine
The symposium opened with insights from Judiann Carmack-Fayyaz, executive director of The FoodLab. Originally focused on supporting local agricultural producers and preserving regional food production over the past four years, the initiative is now expanding into nutrition education. Carmack-Fayyaz noted that a primary mission is exploring the power of plants and food as medicine to help individuals take control of their health through food and lifestyle practices.
That philosophy was expanded upon by Raja Jaber, MD, director of lifestyle and integrative medicine at Stony Brook Medicine and clinical professor of family medicine at the Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University. Drawing on her early experiences immigrating from Lebanon to a neighborhood defined by shared outdoor meals, neighborhood walking routines, and active gardening, Jaber connected community social structures directly to the research into communities where people live longer, healthier lives.
“The memory was this community that communicated with each other, that ate together, that grew their food, that walked, that moved,” Jaber said during her presentation. As a family physician, she noted that lifestyle medicine provides practical tools because everyday behaviors—specifically nutrition, physical activity, and sleep—can influence health.
Transforming Institutional Nutrition and Healthy Aging
Moving from community frameworks to elder care, Krista Zvoch, director of nutrition for StoryPoint Group, addressed the intersection of nutrition and quality of life in senior living environments. Challenging the assumption that older populations are indifferent to dietary modifications, Zvoch pointed to organizational data showing that 74 percent of senior living residents actively desire healthier menu selections.
Zvoch stressed that clinical nutrition plans for older adults must balance nutritional density with the preservation of personal autonomy and culinary enjoyment. Within specialized memory care settings, StoryPoint modified its operational approach, transitioning mealtimes from a mechanical caregiving task into an engaging, socially supportive dining experience.
The morning’s programming also incorporated cultural traditions in healing, featuring presentations by Sohl Lee, PhD, associate professor of art at Stony Brook University, who examined the historical and nutritional significance of the traditional Korean postpartum seaweed soup, miyeok-guk. Paula Montagna, MS, RD, CDN, CNSC, director of clinical nutrition at Stony Brook Southampton Hospital, bridged clinical science and practical application by concluding the event with an interactive culinary demonstration and a farm-to-table lunch reflecting food-as-medicine principles.
| Speaker / Expert | Affiliation | Core Clinical Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Raja Jaber, MD | Stony Brook Medicine / Renaissance School of Medicine | Lifestyle medicine, integrative care |
| Krista Zvoch, RD | StoryPoint Group | Nutrition for healthy aging, longevity, and quality of life |
| Paula Montagna, MS, RD, CDN, CNSC | Stony Brook Southampton Hospital | Translating clinical nutrition science into culinary practice |
| Sohl Lee, PhD | Stony Brook University | Cultural food traditions and historical postpartum healing practices |
Future Directions in Preventive Health
Events like the Stony Brook Southampton symposium highlight a broader clinical transition toward exploring the power of plants and food as medicine. By equipping patients with actionable nutritional knowledge and fostering environments that support sustained healthy behaviors, academic medical centers are working to bridge the gap between clinical research and daily patient independence.
