What Kinds of Meals Are Meals on Wheels Providing? (0:59)
Meals On Wheels provides nutritious, calorie-rich meals to seniors who face hunger challenges. HealthMaker Ellie Hollander talks in this video about the types of meals a recipient can expect, and how they are tailored based on individual need.
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Nutritious meals, meals that really pack of punch. There is a dietary requirement that at least 33 and one-third percent of the calories that a person eats in a day would be provided through one meal. But we know for a fact that those meals really pack of punches more like 50%, it may be the only meal that the senior gets, so we want to make sure that there's enough in there.
The meals are tasty I've traveled to many programs across the county since I started here and I have to say that they are all culturally adapted depending on what part of country you're in, but they're very tasty and dispelled the myth I had which was, at all cost, would you really want a meal on wheel and the answer is yes, it's actually quite good.
Meals can be prepared based on the need of the individual, so if somebody has physical limitations or swallowing issues or so forth it can be pureed or it can be for diabetics, and so there is more, more choice today than there ever was before.
Ellie Hollander is president and CEO of the Meals On Wheels Association of America. She has decades of experience working with aging populations, membership organizations, for-profits and non-profits.
