An updated electronic health records-embedded assessment will help clinicians systematically capture lifestyle and whole-person health factors long missing from routine care, supporting more effective, preventive, and value-based practice.
ST. LOUIS, March 25, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — As whole-person care accelerates across the U.S. health care system, clinicians face a persistent and consequential gap: the lifestyle and upstream health factors that drive chronic disease remain largely unmeasured, undocumented, and uncompensated in health care data systems.
To close that gap, the American College of Lifestyle Medicine (ACLM) has launched the Lifestyle Medicine Whole Person Health Index (LMWPHI)— a point-of-care assessment tool designed to support the delivery of whole-person care in everyday clinical practice. The LMWPHI, central to operationalizing high-quality, evidence-based, high-value care, is embedded within Epic Foundation systems nationwide, with an updated version scheduled for relaunch in May. Integration with eClinicalWorks is underway, enabling broad adoption across diverse care settings.
The LMWPHI is a brief, patient-reported assessment that can be completed before or during a patient encounter and is designed to capture behavior in the six pillars of lifestyle medicine – domains strongly associated with chronic disease risk:
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Nutrition
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Physical activity
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Sleep quality and duration
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Stress and anxiety/depression
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Substance use, including tobacco, alcohol and drug use
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Connectedness, relationships, purpose, and meaning
Whole-person care—the recognition that health outcomes are shaped by the interconnected influences of physical, mental, emotional, social, and behavioral health—has moved from an aspirational concept to a clinical and policy priority. Recent federal policy actions underscore this shift, including the creation of new payment pathways for lifestyle and prevention, such as the G0136 HCPCS code finalized in the 2026 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (PFS) for physical activity and nutrition assessment and the new MAHA ELEVATE Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation model.
Despite this progress, clinicians have lacked standardized, workflow-ready tools to systematically assess and document these upstream drivers of health in a way that supports both care delivery and emerging payment and quality frameworks.
“The interest and momentum around whole-person care is real and accelerating,” said ACLM President Padmaja Patel, MD, DipABLM, FACLM, CPE, Lifestyle Medicine Intensivist. “But until now, we haven’t had comprehensive tools that make this approach operational in routine clinical practice that could be tracked over time. The LMWPHI fills that void. It gives clinicians a structured, evidence-informed way to see the whole patient—not just their chief complaint—and aligns with where health care policy and payment are clearly headed.”
