American College of Lifestyle Medicine

Education & events: spanning the medical education continuum, aclm's work includes a focus on undergraduate medical education (ume), graduate medical education (gme), and continuing medical education (cme) that now includes 51 total cme/ce- accredited course offerings, including the new 18-hour "remission of type 2 and reversal of insulin resistance certificate" course. 34,000 medical professionals registered for aclm's complimentary 5.5-hour cme/ce accredited "Lifestyle Medicine and food as Medicine essentials" online course. Aclm's pledge of 100,000 complimentary course registrations was showcased in support of the white house conference on hunger, nutrition and health. In 2023, aclm expanded this commitment to 200,000 free registrations through september 2025. Regularly priced at 220, this represents a 44m commitment by aclm to advance food as Medicine in medical education. The Lifestyle Medicine residency curriculum (lmrc) was contracted into 135 sites and 302 residency programs, with over 7,000 enrollees. Aclm has established and facilitates 140 Lifestyle Medicine interest groups (lmigs), operating on medical, health professional and health system campuses across the country. Within the first year, 38 academic pathway programs have been approved, resulting in students who complete these programs already having fulfilled some prerequisites for the American board of Lifestyle Medicine (ablm) exam. Aclm's sold-out lm2023 scientific conference, with 2,000 in-person registrants, was hosted in denver, co, with an additional 1,200 attendees participating virtually. This conference meets the live cme prerequisite to sit for the ablm exam, while aclm's "foundations of Lifestyle Medicine board review course" is regarded as the premier non-live board exam preparatory curriculum. Evidence of the growing interest in the field, there was a 35% increase in ablm exam registration between 2022 and 2023 by those desiring certification in the field. Since the inaugural 2017 exam, 3,128 physicians in the u.s. have become board certified in Lifestyle Medicine, along with 1,277 other health professionals. Worldwide, across 72 countries, 5,017 physicians and 1,671 other clinicians are certified for a total of 6,688.

Practice advancement & health equity: aclm's health equity achieved through Lifestyle Medicine (heal) initiative expanded in 2023, with a continued focus on outreach to historically black colleges and universities (hbcus) and expansion of aclm's heal scholarship, equipping under-represented in Medicine (uim) clinicians with training and the opportunity for certification in the field of Lifestyle Medicine. 18 heal scholarships were awarded in 2023, with the goal of reducing health disparities and diversifying the medical workforce. The national training initiative (nti) was launched in the fall of 2023, a Lifestyle Medicine training and certification scholarship program, delivered in partnership with the American board of Lifestyle Medicine, designed to educate and equip primary care providers (pcps) in each of our nation's ~1,400 federally qualified health centers (fqhcs) to deliver Lifestyle Medicine, including food as Medicine, intervention, education and support to patients in our under-served communities. Aclm established a practice advancement focus area in support of the trailblazing work of the clinical practice and quality committee (cpqc), which in 2023 included the Lifestyle Medicine reimbursement summit, advocacy work related to the medicare physician fee schedule, and addressing with cms and nqf misaligned quality measures, as well as supporting the buildout of an epic emr Lifestyle Medicine electronic medical record template. Aclm's health systems council (hsc) expanded to 103 members in just its second year, bringing together systems united in the pursuit of healthcare transformation to address unsustainable levels of chronic disease through integration of Lifestyle Medicine.

Research: aclm's research department published two expert consensus statements (ecs) in 2023: "American College of Lifestyle Medicine expert consensus statement: Lifestyle Medicine for optimal outcomes in primary care" (American journal of Lifestyle Medicine. 2023:15598276231202970) and "Lifestyle Medicine intensivist competencies: 2023 expert consensus update" (American journal of Lifestyle Medicine. 2023:15598276231192846). Work has begun on development of aclm's first clinical practice guideline titled "Lifestyle interventions for treatment of type 2 diabetes and pre- diabetes in adults." Other aclm publications included "remission of type 2 diabetes after treatment with a high-fiber, low-fat, plant-predominant diet intervention: a case series" (American journal of Lifestyle Medicine. 2023;17(6):839- 846), "Lifestyle Medicine practitioners implementing a greater proportion of Lifestyle Medicine experience less burnout" (am j health promot. 2023;37(8):1121-1132), and "commonalities among dietary recommendations from 2010 to 2021 clinical practice guidelines: a meta-epidemiological study from the American College of Lifestyle Medicine" (adv nutr. 2023;14 (3):500-515). Aclm sponsored a special issue on food as Medicine in the journal frontiers in nutrition, with 16 articles published in 2023 and several more in review.

Membership & operations: led by a passionate and visionary board of directors, aclm continues to experience rapid membership growth, nearing the 11,000-member mark, representing a 20% increase from fy22 to fy23 in paid membership. Member interest groups (migs), facilitating active aclm member engagement, grew to 30 in total in 2023, with three new groups formed: food as medicine/culinary Medicine, Lifestyle Medicine in primary care, and neurology and group medical visits. Aclm's migs saw a 183% increase in membership from 2022 to 2023, with some groups now having as many as 1,000 members. Aclm connect, our online member community, launched in november 2021, is experiencing tremendous growth in engagement-now considered one of aclm's most valued member benefits. In 2023, there were nearly 60,000 downloads from aclm's extensive library of educational tools and resources, with connect facilitating over 1,600 new discussion posts and over 9,500 unique logins (over 33,500 total logins) to the community. Aclm's jobs board continues to grow, with job opening posts from many of healthcare's most prominent brands. In order to assist patients searching for a Lifestyle medicine-trained clinician, lmpros.com, aclm's directory of certified Lifestyle Medicine clinicians, is continuing to expand. Aclm earned many high-visibility media placements in 2023, including the wall street journal, new york times, becker's hospital review, consumer affairs, medscape, and healio. We launched a blog, resulting in more than 50,000 views, and our monthly curated newsletter, insider, was published for the fourth year, consistently exceeding industry averages for readership and clicks. Expanding our virtual staff to 35 dedicated professionals across 20 states has been essential to support the growth in size and scope of aclm's membership and mission-advance initiatives. This is supported by aclm's multi-factor authentication office environment and website hosting on a tier 4 server ensures the highest level of cyber security. Our enhanced customer service software and capacity is also intended to ensure optimal member and customer support.