Bringing Nutrition to Medical School Curriculum

The idea came to Katarina during her third-year rotations, when she noticed a pattern in her interactions with patients. “When you’re having these conversations about diagnoses with your patients, usually the appointment would end with them asking me about nutrition—how many calories they should eat, what they should eat,” she said. This phenomenon, paired with her long-standing passion for health research, prompted Katarina and Dr. Ali to conduct a literature review investigating the emphasis—or lack thereof—on nutritional education across osteopathic medical schools nationwide.

Their findings were eye-opening: “We really did see that there were not a lot of medical schools, especially DO schools, that were incorporating [nutrition] into their curriculum,” Katarina explained. “MD schools were a little further along the curve in the past and had tried to make some improvements, but they really weren’t substantial or sustainable.” The article proposes potential pathways to resolving this issue, such as increasing funding opportunities and including nutrition competencies in medical licensure requirements. “The Undernourished Curriculum” laid the foundation for subsequent grants and projects; it’s the first of three collaborations between Katarina and Dr. Ali. Their research, which aims to improve patient outcomes from the ground up, aligns closely with osteopathic philosophy’s emphasis on preventative care.

Katarina believes her research experience at TouroCOM will be instrumental to her success as a future physician. “It really has helped me think more like a scientist and a researcher. It's also closed the gap between being a clinician helping patients with their medical problems and also being able to use my medical knowledge to push the boundaries of medicine…And I think that as med students, that's something you really forget all the time because you're so bogged down with the learning, and so people tend to see medicine as a rather traditional path,” She said, adding that her work opened her eyes to what the field can offer.

Katarina plans to carry this research experience into her residency, where she hopes to continue exploring innovations in medical education and regional differences in nutrition practices. Her research at Touro is only the starting point in her efforts to improve the system: “If Dr. Ali and I, from East Coast to West Coast, can do something about this, and if other med students get inspired, then I think that's how change is made down the line.”

Katarina and Dr. Ali’s research created a partnership that will continue even across state lines. “I’m not going to let her go,” Dr. Ali joked.