When Dr. Chris Marchioni started practicing medicine, she naively thought she would not just be in the business of curing diseases, but preventing them. She learned, however, she only saw kids when they got sick or needed a physical.

In her 20 years of practice, she said she started “seeing a real shift in terms of the challenges children are going through … and saw a wider gap in terms of what parents understood about health care.”

A big part of the problem was insurance typically didn`t pay for prevention.

“It is not until someone`s diabetes is out of control that some insurance companies will pay for nutritional counseling,” she said.

A little education early on could prevent diabetes altogether at a fraction of the cost of a lifetime of insulin and medical care, but doctors tend to do what they`re paid to do, she said.

Sabrina Atencio, front, helps make a tray of celery, cream cheese and tomato snacks with Alex Najera, left, and Mike Gross and teacher Miki Novaria during Emerald Elementary School 2nd grader's Healthy Learning Paths program by Dr. Chris Marchioni, October 20, 3009 Staff photo/David R. Jennings

Marchioni points to a recommendation by the American Academy of Pediatrics last year to prescribe cholesterol-lowering drugs to children as young as 8, when the problem could much more easily be addressed through diet.

So in 2005, she started Healthy Learning Paths to get medical professionals into schools once a month to teach about nutrition, exercise, sleep, stress and other aspects of healthy living.

“While they`re in Washington trying to figure out what to do with health care reform, we`re already doing something about it,” she said.

She started her pilot project at Emerald Elementary School because it was local and she could reach children in their formative years.

She started with zero funding, and as a Title I school, which typically has at least 40 percent of the student population qualifying for the free or reduced-price lunch program, it was easier to apply for grants. Plus, principal Larry Leatherman was completely on board with the idea.

“She connected with the preschool, and then it expanded and first grade got involved, then second grade got involved,” Leatherman said.

Now the entire school, with the exception of kindergarten, is participating.

“When they eat healthy foods, no matter what, kids are going to learn more,” Leatherman said.

In her program, Marchioni has students make healthy snacks, such as hummus or cut-up apples and bananas.

“So many times, parents say kids won`t eat fruits and vegetables,” Marchioni said. “Let me tell you, when we walk out of there, they`ve cleaned their plates.”

What`s even better, she said, is the information filters home to parents. (Marchioni does seminars for parents, as well.)

She also has kids dissect chicken wings when they were learning about bones and joints in their science classes. Except she doesn`t just teach them definitions, but rather how to keep joints healthy.

With seed money from the Broomfield Rotary Club, she was able to get a grant from the Colorado Health Foundation and Jared Polis Foundation to help pay the fees for professionals to visit the schools. She also has been hired to teach classes at Coyote Ridge Elementary, and got some money to do a program at Sanchez Elementary in Lafayette.

By the end of the year she hopes to have a blueprint to bring the program into more schools. So, she and other doctors will get to see more and more children before they get sick, so they can avoid some of those health-related problems they might develop when habits are much harder to fix.

By Dylan Otto Krider, Enterprise Staff Writer
11/11/09 Broomfield Enterprise