Doralynne Jarvis and her team of dietitians at Avera Sacred Heart Hospital were awarded the Avera Quality Congress Award for the "Healthy Snacking & Vending Munch Code" project, according to the Yankton Daily. The award, which recognizes achievements across the Avera system, highlights how the location was able to add more healthy snacks into the hospital vending machines and also implement color codes on those snacks. Jarvis spearheaded the efforts and worked closely with the vending company, Cody Vending Co Inc based in Yankton, SD, in order to make the program work. Jarvis is quoted as saying there was a lot of time spent on working with Cody Vending, finding out what the company could procure and balancing that with what the dietitians wanted to see in the machines. The result is a variety of choices all color coded so the vending machine users can to identify what is healthier and what is a more indulgent snack.
Editor's Insight: Kudos to Cody Vending to working with the dietitians and coming up with a way to offer healthy items. The work I'm sure that they put into the program shouldn't be overlooked.