Policy & Advocacy
Policy Priorities
Coding4Food
Medical codes are a critical component of our health care system – enabling health care providers to accurately bill insurance providers for services and labor and track a patient’s medical journey by recording assessments, referrals, treatments, and procedures. As our country continues to expand the health care system’s ability to screen for and address health-related social needs, new medical codes must be created to reflect these new pathways of care. Despite the recent increase in interest and attention to the integration of food-based interventions into health care payment and delivery systems, there remains a lack of health care terminology and codes to document and bill for medically supportive food and nutrition services.
In partnership with The Gravity Project, the Coding4Food Advisory Committee will pull together practitioners and experts from across the MSF&N spectrum to build consensus around food-based intervention definitions to inform the creation of new medical codes to document and bill for food-based intervention activities and services.
Held in Assembly Appropriations Committee May 2023
Medi-Cal: Medically Supportive Food and Nutrition Services would transition medically supportive food and nutrition interventions from optional services in healthcare to covered Medi-Cal benefits. Transitioning medically supportive food and nutrition interventions from optional services under a time limited waiver in healthcare to covered Medi-Cal benefits will improve health outcomes and advance health equity across California. It will also reduce avoidable healthcare costs and support the prevention, not just the treatment, of chronic conditions.
CalAIM implementation advocacy
In addition to transitioning MSF&N interventions from pilot to permanent we also work to reduce barriers to adoption and scaling of MSF&N interventions through CalAIM community supports. This has included advocating for the Department of Health Care Services to increase the suggested rates for food-based interventions in their guidance to health plans. In the future this may also include advocacy to expand eligibility for MSF&N interventions, simplify referral pathways, and other emergent needs.
Introduced January 2024
Assemblymember Bonta introduced precedent setting legislation to transition of MSF&N services from pilot to permanent in two phases. First, to support a smooth transition grounded in the experiences of Medi-Cal members and providers, AB 1975 calls for an Advisory Workgroup to support the Department of Health Care Services in crafting benefit guidance. Then in phase two, after completion of the guidance, the permanent benefit will launch in July, 2026.
AB 1975 must pass this year for the Workgroup to start with enough time to provide guidance before the permanent benefit launches. This also means there is only a small budget appropriation needed this year to start the Workgroup. The benefit and the associated costs will not take effect until fiscal year 2026/27.
We expect the bill to be heard in Assembly Health Committee in mid-March and want to elevate the broad support for this policy among MSF&N providers, health plans, healthcare providers and institutions, farmers and food distributors, food policy councils, and government agencies. To join a group support letter please fill out this google form by 5pm PST on March 8th.
Primary Care Physician
“[Food Pharmacy] feels like, okay, we're listening to people, and we're giving them something that they've been telling us has been a problem for them”
Learn More
Visit our Medically Supportive Food & Nutrition Resources page.