Medically tailored grocery boxes for New York HRSN programs
Morrissey Market designs, packs, and ships medically tailored grocery boxes for New York’s health-related social needs benefit. We build to the HYPNAP choice requirements the state uses to define a qualifying nutrition box, and we ship to the member’s door. Social Care Networks, Medicaid managed care plans, and the community-based organizations delivering HRSN services all work with us the same way: you own the member relationship, we own the box.
What New York's HRSN nutrition benefit covers
New York’s 1115 waiver, known as New York Health Equity Reform, created a Medicaid benefit for health-related social needs. HRSN is the state’s term for the non-medical conditions that drive medical cost, including nutrition insecurity, housing instability, and transportation. Nutrition is one of the covered service categories.
The benefit is delivered through Social Care Networks. An SCN is a regional entity contracted by the state to screen Medicaid members for health-related social needs, refer them to services, and pay the organizations that deliver those services. Members enter through a provider referral or an HRSN self-screener.
Nutrition services under the benefit include medically tailored meals, medically tailored groceries, produce prescriptions, and nutrition counseling. Morrissey Market fulfills the grocery side: medically tailored grocery boxes and produce prescription boxes, packed to a defined standard and shipped weekly.
What a medically tailored grocery box is
A medically tailored grocery box is a weekly box of raw ingredients selected for a member’s diagnosed condition and dietary needs, built by registered dietitians. The member cooks the food. That is the difference from medically tailored meals, which arrive fully prepared and single-serve.
Groceries cost less per week than prepared meals, they feed the household rather than one person, and they build cooking skills that outlast the program. Meals fit members who cannot cook. Most HRSN nutrition populations can, which is why groceries carry the volume in state programs.
Our boxes include fresh produce, protein, dairy, grains, and shelf-stable pantry items, on a seasonal, rotating menu with recipes in every box.
Boxes built to New York HYPNAP choice requirements
New York defines what a qualifying nutrition box has to contain. The requirements come from the state’s HYPNAP framework, published in Appendix M of the SCN program manual, and they are written as required choices per category rather than as a simple item list.
We build every New York box to that framework and verify it choice by choice before a menu is approved. Each menu goes through a written mapping: every item in the box is assigned to its category, no item is counted twice, and the totals are checked against the state requirement before the box ships. Your dietitian sees that mapping and signs off on it.
Two practical things this changes. Beans used to fill a protein choice are low sodium. At least one canned fruit or vegetable stays in the build, so a box still meets its requirement on a week when fresh produce runs short.
If your dietitian has already approved a menu, we will build to it rather than ask you to adopt ours.
Box formats
- Standard
- Vegetarian
- Allergen-friendly
- Kids
- Pantry stocking
Condition-specific menus available across formats: wellness, diabetic, cardiac, renal, and vegetarian. Culturally appropriate substitutions are built in, not added on.
How a program launches
- Scope. Your clinical team and ours set the diet types, the box formats, and the weekly volume. We ship sample boxes before launch so your dietitian reviews the real thing, not a spec sheet.
- Approval. We map each menu to the HYPNAP choice requirements and send it for your dietitian’s written sign-off.
- Referrals. We integrate with your eligibility and referral file so enrollment is closed loop. Members do not re-enroll with us.
- Ship. Weekly delivery to the member’s door, cold chain packed, with recipes and nutrition guidance in the box.
- Report. Monthly reporting your SCN and plan partners can use for their own program integrity and outcome reporting.
Pricing steps down as volume grows, and it is set before launch so your budget holds.
The evidence behind medically tailored groceries
23%
fewer hospitalizations
13%
fewer emergency department visits
300
participants in a funded trial of medically tailored groceries
Payers separate diet outcomes from clinical outcomes from cost outcomes, so we do too.
Diet quality and food security. This is where the grocery evidence is strongest. Across nine produce prescription programs, adults raised fruit and vegetable intake from 2.7 to 3.6 cups a day (Hager et al., Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, 2023). The American Heart Association’s 2025 review of Food is Medicine randomized trials found consistent improvement in diet quality and food security across the literature.
Clinical markers. An evaluation of four produce prescription projects using electronic health record data found HbA1c down 0.5 points overall, and down 1.9 points among participants who started above 9 percent. Blood pressure improved most in members with stage 2 hypertension (Zigmont et al., Preventive Medicine Reports, 2026). These were single-cohort evaluations without control groups, so treat them as directional rather than proof.
Utilization and cost. Massachusetts Medicaid’s Flexible Services program was associated with 23 percent fewer hospitalizations and 13 percent fewer emergency department visits across more than 20,000 members (Hager et al., Health Affairs). Food boxes and groceries were among the nutrition supports evaluated, alongside meals, produce prescriptions, and vouchers. The published results do not separate effects by support type.
What we are building. Morrissey Market supplies the medically tailored grocery boxes for the Community Servings Synergy Initiative in Central Massachusetts, funded by the Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts. The pilot ran 24 weeks across five diet tracks: wellness, diabetic, cardiac, renal, and vegetarian. The next phase is a funded three-year randomized controlled trial of medically tailored groceries with 300 participants, led by researchers at UMass Chan Medical School. We are the fulfillment partner.
None of the published figures above are Morrissey Market results. They are the evidence base for the model we supply.
Statewide coverage
We ship to every county in New York from East Coast fulfillment, including the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, Long Island, the Hudson Valley, the Capital Region, the Southern Tier, Central New York, and Western New York. Transit is one to two days statewide.
Fresher because the box skips the store
Produce in a Morrissey Market box is picked from a produce distribution hub and packed into the member’s box that week. It never enters a retail store. No retail warehouse, no store backroom, no display case, no days sitting under lights waiting to be bought. The box goes from the hub to the member’s door in one to two days, packed cold in insulated, temperature-protected packaging.
Every day and every handoff you remove is shelf life the member gets to keep. A box that arrives with its shelf life ahead of it gets eaten. A box that arrives already tired gets thrown out, and a program that wastes food does not change outcomes.
Time and temperature are what cost produce its nutrients. Penn State researchers tracking commercially packaged spinach measured folate falling to 53 percent retention after 8 days at 39 degrees Fahrenheit, and reaching that same loss in 4 days at room temperature (Pandrangi and LaBorde, Journal of Food Science, 2004). Postharvest research puts the rate of deterioration at two to three times faster for every 10 degree Celsius rise in temperature (FAO Agricultural Services Bulletin 152). Shortening the chain and protecting the temperature is how we protect what is actually in the food.
Frequently asked questions
What is HRSN in New York Medicaid?
HRSN stands for health-related social needs. It is the category New York uses in its 1115 waiver, New York Health Equity Reform, for non-medical needs that affect health outcomes, including nutrition insecurity, housing, and transportation. Nutrition services are a covered HRSN service category for eligible Medicaid members.
What is a Social Care Network?
A Social Care Network, or SCN, is a regional entity contracted by New York State to screen Medicaid members for health-related social needs, refer them to services, and pay the organizations delivering those services. SCNs are the contracting path for HRSN nutrition benefits in New York.
Do you work with Social Care Networks or with the plans?
Both, and with the community-based organizations under them. We are the fulfillment partner. You hold the member relationship, the referral pathway, and the contract with the state or the plan. We build the box, pack it, ship it, and report on it.
Are your boxes compliant with New York nutrition requirements?
Yes. We build every New York box to the state HYPNAP choice requirements and verify each menu against them before it ships. Your dietitian receives the item-by-item mapping and signs off before launch.
What is the difference between medically tailored groceries and medically tailored meals?
Medically tailored groceries are raw ingredients the member cooks, selected for their condition by a registered dietitian. Medically tailored meals are fully prepared and single-serve. Groceries cost less per week, feed the whole household, and build cooking skills. Meals fit members who cannot cook.
What health conditions do your boxes support?
Diabetes and prediabetes, cardiovascular disease and hypertension, chronic kidney disease, pregnancy and postpartum nutrition, and general wellness for members with nutrition insecurity and no single primary diagnosis. Vegetarian, allergen-friendly, and kids formats run across all of them.
How do members get enrolled?
Through your existing pathway. Members are screened and referred by your SCN, plan, or provider network, and we receive an eligibility file. There is no separate signup with Morrissey Market and no cost to the member.
How quickly can a New York program launch?
Four to six weeks from a signed scope in most cases. The two items that set the timeline are dietitian sign-off on the menus and packaging lead time, which runs three to eight weeks depending on whether the program needs custom printing.
What reporting do we receive?
Monthly reporting on boxes shipped, delivery confirmation, substitutions, and any service exceptions, formatted so your team can roll it into SCN and plan reporting. We build the reporting around what your contract requires rather than handing you a fixed template.
Can you source food grown in New York?
Yes. We buy from regional farms where the season and the volume allow, and we will name the sourcing in your program materials when it matters to your community.
Do you serve programs outside New York?
Yes. We ship nationwide and run programs in multiple states under 1115 waivers, in-lieu-of services, and state Food is Medicine programs. New York has its own page because its choice requirements and its Social Care Network structure are specific to the state.
Can you match a menu our dietitians already approved?
Yes. We build to your approved menu. If an item creates a transit or sourcing problem, we bring you a substitution and the reason, and your dietitian decides.
