About

Beth Pegg Frates is an Associate Professor (Part Time) in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at Harvard Medical School. She is also the Director of Wellness Programming at the Stroke Institute at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital and the Director of Lifestyle Medicine and Wellness in the Department of Surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Frates is trained as a physiatrist and a health and wellness coach, with expertise in lifestyle medicine. Her work focuses on empowering patients to reach their optimal level of wellness by adopting healthy habits. At Harvard Medical School, she created the first Lifestyle Medicine Interest Group in 2008, which remains active. She is an award-winning teacher, having developed and taught a popular college lifestyle medicine curriculum at the Harvard Extension School, and shared resources such as syllabi, PowerPoints, and curriculum through the ACLM website to serve as templates for other educators. As the Director of Wellness Programming at the Stroke Institute, she developed and implemented a 12-step wellness program called PAVING the Path to Wellness™ for patients and providers. In her role at Mass General Hospital, she is experienced in physician wellbeing programming. Dr. Frates is a co-author of the book 'Life After Stroke: The Guide to Recovering Your Health and Preventing Another Stroke' and has contributed chapters on behavior change in medical textbooks. She also co-authored 'The Lifestyle Medicine Handbook: An Introduction to the Power of Healthy Habits,' which was ranked in the top 20 by Book Authority for medical books released in 2018. In August 2020, she was voted President of the American College of Lifestyle Medicine.

Research topics

• Psychology
• Family medicine
• Medicine
• Gerontology
• Psychiatry
• Pedagogy
• Physical therapy
• Internal medicine
• Psychotherapist
• Medical education
• Nursing
• Management

Selected publications

• Substance use and its impact on food choices

  Karnac Books · 2026-04-14

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Integrating Cancer Rehabilitation and Lifestyle Medicine: A Proposed Partnership and Case Example from the RISE Cancer Survivorship Clinic

  Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation · 2026-05-01

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Empowering healthy eating patterns

  Karnac Books · 2026-04-14

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Sleep and food choices:

  Karnac Books · 2026-04-14

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Introduction to culinary psychology

  Karnac Books · 2026-04-14

  book-chapter
  PublisherDOI

• Academic Lifestyle Medicine and Physician Education

  American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine · 2025-06-27 · 4 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  The habits and practices that individuals adopt in their daily lives profoundly impact their quality of life and also their short and long-term health and risk of developing chronic disease. This is the fundamental basis of the rapidly emerging field of lifestyle medicine. Lifestyle medicine has begun to take its place in mainstream academic medicine but more needs to be done. Despite the fact that the benefits of regular physical activity, proper nutrition, weight management, avoidance of risky substances, and connection to other people are strongly supported in the academic literature, many mainstream physicians have been slow to embrace the overall concept. The reluctance to embrace the concept of lifestyle medicine may be the result of inadequate physician education in this overall field. The purpose of the current article is to provide an overview of the robust academic evidence supporting the fundamental principles of lifestyle medicine and offer advice for physicians about how to obtain additional education in this area. We particularly emphasize the need for medical schools and academic physicians to become more knowledgeable and offer instruction in lifestyle medicine.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Teaching Assistants: Essential Members of the Teaching Team

  American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine · 2025-03-27 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  The teaching of courses usually occurs in teams. Teaching assistants are an integral part of that team. In order for medical and healthcare professional schools to have impactful teachers, it is important to provide students and residents with opportunities to teach. Serving as a teaching assistant provides practice for people who want to include teaching in their professional careers. Teaching is an art that is enhanced by multiple perspectives.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Lifestyle medicine pillars for women's heart health

  American Journal of Preventive Cardiology · 2025-08-22

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Lifestyle factors, including physical activity, dietary patterns, sleep, stress response, social connections, and use of risky substances, are increasingly recognized as predictors of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and cardiovascular health, with significant overlap between the American Heart Association's Life's Essential 8 guidelines and the 6 pillars of Lifestyle Medicine (LM). Assessing and addressing lifestyle factors have a foundational role in the prevention and management of cardiovascular disease and improving cardiovascular health. Sex and/or gender related factors can influence access, engagement, and adherence to guidelines around lifestyle and may lead to differential effects on cardiovascular risk and outcomes that are not well understood. This review summarizes the research on sex and gender factors that impact lifestyle medicine for women, including motivations and barriers to adopt LM recommendations, impact on cardiac risk factors and physiology, and interactions among LM pillars that influence women's cardiovascular risk and outcomes. Recognition of the reproductive age and perimenopausal predictors of higher cardiovascular and cardiometabolic risks can provide windows of opportunity to discuss lifestyle and primary prevention across the lifespan. While more research is needed, a deeper understanding of these sex and gender differences related to lifestyle and heart health for women has the potential to support earlier discussions and referrals when indicated to preventive cardiologists and LM certified clinicians, including physicians, dieticians, exercise physiologists, sleep specialists, social workers, behavioral therapists, and coaches. Alignment of LM education with women's symptoms, preferences, and goals may increase adherence to guidelines around physical activity, whole food plant predominant nutrition, sleep quality and quantity, stress management, social connections and avoidance of risky substances, leading to reduced cardiovascular risk and improved cardiovascular health and outcomes.

  PublisherDOI

• Defining Culinary Medicine: A Call for Consensus on Competencies to Improve Nutrition

  Nutrients · 2025-04-22 · 4 citations

  articleOpen access

  Most premature adult deaths and chronic diseases, with their associated costs, are directly related to unhealthy behaviors, particularly poor nutrition. The 2022 White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health emphasized the importance of nutrition equity and security as a key to preventing chronic diseases. What and how we eat also have important environmental impacts, with 26% of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions attributed to the total food supply chain, primarily ultra-processed food (UPF) production. A new paradigm is needed to better educate patients and the public to adopt healthier eating behaviors. Culinary education, emphasizing skills such as shopping, food storage, and meal preparation is a burgeoning field, aimed at reducing UPF consumption and improving nutrition while addressing cultural and socioeconomic factors. The term Culinary Medicine (CM) is becoming popular in describing these interventions; however, a consensus on its definition has not yet been reached. There are no consensual curricular outlines and/or competencies, and the potential for addressing food security and equity has not yet been fully developed. We believe that consensual competencies will formalize CM and ensure appropriate outcomes followed by improved assessments of learners, thus promoting CM research and further implementation of this novel nutrition education approach.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Online Lifestyle Medicine Curriculum: Development and Implementation

  Lifestyle Medicine · 2025-01-01

  book-chapterOpen accessSenior author

  Many healthcare professional schools do not have the space in their curriculum to teach lifestyle medicine. Barriers to including lifestyle medicine in the core curriculum include a lack of faculty trained/knowledgeable in exercise, nutrition, sleep, stress resiliency, social connection, and avoidance of risky substances. Resources/funding are needed to deliver these programs. Online programs fill gaps in lifestyle medicine education by providing evidence-based, high-quality courses taught by lifestyle medicine experts. Online courses are scalable, replicable, and reliable. Faculty presenting from their home offices on Zoom lowers the cost of production. Online education removes the transportation barrier, eliminates any potential cost of parking, and makes learning convenient. Asynchronous online courses also remove the barrier of finding the time in the workday as they can be taken at any time on any day the learner chooses.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Tatiana Znayenko‐Miller

  Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine

  36 shared

• Sami Bég

  Community Living

  36 shared

• Elizabeth Pegg Frates

  36 shared

• Krystyna Rastorguieva

  Emory University

  36 shared

• Lisa Kisling Thompson

  36 shared

• Daniel Gorenstin

  University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

  36 shared

• Roy Phitayakorn

  Massachusetts General Hospital

  20 shared

• Kelsey Carney

  Massachusetts General Hospital

  16 shared

Awards & honors

• Voted President of the American College of Lifestyle Medicin…