Customers of this delivery service could order chicken fajitas. Others may opt for the pan-seared salmon with rice and sautéed spinach, or shrimp partnered with couscous and an array of vegetables.
These are just a few of the crafted meals available through MDMeals, a Las Vegas-based service that aims to provide meals that prevent, delay and treat a variety of medical conditions.
Customers, ordering online, select one or more medical conditions—such as heart and kidney disease, gout or high blood pressure—and then choose meals from a list analyzed by dietitian nutritionists within the parameters of that condition.
Meals are frozen and delivered to the consumer’s doorstep. The company launched last year.
“Oftentimes, when you’re making it yourself, it isn’t very flavorful,” said Liza Henley, a marketing strategist for MDMeals. “And so having chefs and doctors and nutritionists come together to be able to make those meals for you, it allows for you to not have to sit down and think about what you’re going to cook.”
MDMeals co-founder and CEO Wael Eid, a pulmonary, critical care and sleep physician in Las Vegas for more than 20 years, said he and his business partner—also a medical doctor—noticed in their practice that many patients would not follow the recommended diet for any given condition.
He attributed that to busy lifestyles getting in the way, a lack of knowledge around the guidelines or an inability to cook appropriately. MDMeals set out to rectify the issue and make it easy for people to adhere to a diet.
MDMeals’ food strictly follows recommended guidelines for meals according to specific medical conditions down to the amount of vegetables, fiber, fat and sugar, Eid said.
“Following the recommended diet has tremendous benefit,” he said, pointing to evidence that proper diet can send prediabetic people or people with Type 2 diabetes into remission.
Many people get overwhelmed when a medical provider informs them of a diagnosis that requires a specific diet, Eid said, and they rarely get enough help.
“They get the handout: how to eat healthy,” he said. “But how to translate that into action where you need to bring all these ingredients, cook appropriately, have the portion right, and at the end, create this meal that fits what you need—it’s hard, especially for someone with (a) new diagnosis. We want to take that burden.”
MDMeals doesn’t require a prescription, Eid said, and provides 10 or 20 meals at a time to ensure consistency.
And, he added, MDMeals provides healthy, balanced options so families or spouses who need to adhere to a specific diet can also benefit.
“My vision for this is to not just provide the diet, provide the education with it,” he said. “There’s a lot of misinformation, partial information, (trends) that are not really founded in real science. We go to the (basics). We go to all the data that are backed by real science and medical literature and medical society.”
Eid’s dream is that health insurance will eventually cover food like that provided by MDMeals, at least to some extent, and recognize that healthy diets improve quality of life and save significantly on health care costs.
“I want this to be the first thing insurance and health care target, instead of going to the next pill and next procedure and next surgery,” he said. “I want prevention to be the focus, including meals.”
Henley echoed the sentiment, saying MDMeals is about exemplifying that “food is medicine” and plays a vital role in the healing process and managing different conditions.
“Just because you’re a patient doesn’t mean that you don’t have any say,” she said. “Just because you have a chronic illness doesn’t mean that you can’t work toward managing it and or reversing it. What we eat directly impacts that.”
The majority of MDMeals’ customer base is people with chronic illnesses, she said. The company offers them food to increase their energy levels and longevity, and hopefully decrease symptoms, without sacrificing taste and aesthetic.
“Because we also know that food—it’s not just fuel,” Henley said. “It’s nostalgia, it’s memories, it’s bringing people together. There’s a whole experience around food. And so we want people to understand that they don’t have to give all that up just by eating healthier.”
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This story appeared in Las Vegas Weekly.