childhood hunger
Pediatricians Will Screen For Hungry Kids
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Like all pediatricians, Dr. Lori Smith keep tabs on many aspects of her patients’ health, but until recently the Westport-based doctor didn’t always consider whether the children she sees might be going hungry. “It wasn’t something that was necessarily on our radar,” she said. While her practice treats some lower-income patients from nearby Norwalk and Bridgeport, most of the children Smith and her colleagues see come from relatively affluent families. But Smith, who has been a pediatrician for more than 16 years, and her colleagues recently began screening all patients—regardless of their household income—for food insecurity, part of a new effort doctors and advocates hope will help prevent childhood hunger. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) in October recommended that pediatricians screen all patients for hunger at well visits.