A new peer-reviewed paper calls for meaning, purpose and spirituality to be treated as core elements of lifestyle medicine, rather than optional add-ons. Because these directly impact a patient’s ability to adopt and maintain health-promoting behaviors.
This paper, “Meaning, Purpose, and Spirituality in the Clinical Practice of Lifestyle Medicine,” grew out of the 2025 National Summit held by the American College of Lifestyle Medicine (ACLM) in collaboration with the Global Positive Health Institute and funded by the Ardmore Institute of Health. The summit brought together nearly 100 experts to translate decades of research into practical clinical guidance.
The authors synthesize a growing body of evidence showing that meaning, purpose, and spirituality (MPS) are associated with healthier behaviors, greater psychological resilience, better well-being, and even lower mortality risk. Although national organizations such as the Joint Commission and the American Medical Association recognize spirituality as an important aspect of care, these elements are not consistently addressed in daily clinical practice.
We need to see and evaluate patients as whole people and align our care with what is important to them. Holistic lifestyle medicine works because people value their health because of the things that matter to them in life. Connecting these dots naturally creates positive change and can be transformative. That’s how we are wired. ”
Mark Braman, MD, MPH
This paper outlines practical and scalable strategies for integration, including tools for brief psychological history capture, a holistic framework, and team-based workflows that incorporate MPS into intake, documentation, follow-up visits, and group medical visits. The authors emphasize that conversations must be patient-driven, culturally sensitive, and based on compassion and trust. Many of these strategies and resources are detailed in the accompanying toolkit for integrating MPS into clinical practice.
Importantly, this paper focuses on system-level changes needed to support implementation, including adjusting reimbursement models, developing meaningful metrics, and expanding clinician training in whole-person care. They note that ACLM’s recent expansion of the Lifestyle Medicine Connectivity Pillar presents an opportunity to begin integrating spirituality within the lifestyle medicine framework.
This article is one of four published in a special issue of the journal. American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine These comprehensively examine the scientific evidence, clinical practice, education and training, and health implications for clinicians of incorporating meaning, purpose, and spirituality into healthcare.
“This special issue comprehensively addresses the value of understanding the meaning, purpose, and spirituality of medicine, practicing medicine to achieve better clinical care and clinician well-being, and incorporating it into medical education to build the knowledge and skills of future professionals,” said Michaela Karlsen, Ph.D., MSPH, Senior Director of Research and Quality at ACLM. “Clinicians don’t just want to see their patients survive, they want to see their patients thrive. To do that, they need to understand all the factors that determine a patient’s health.”
sauce:
American Society of Lifestyle Medicine
Reference magazines:
Braman, M. others. (2026) Meaning, purpose, and spirituality in the clinical practice of lifestyle medicine. American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine. DOI: 10.1177/15598276261419395. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/15598276261419395
