麻豆传媒

Healthcare workers have been taking part in -- and posting about -- a physician-founded social media competition to raise funds for food banks and other organizations under the name "Healthcare Workers vs Hunger," or .

The competition was started in December 2020 by Angela Weyand, MD, a pediatric hematologist-oncologist at the University of Michigan C.S. Mott Children's Hospital in Ann Arbor, and Tatiana Prowell, MD, an associate professor of oncology at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center in Baltimore. This year's iteration closed on Tuesday.

A for Healthcare Workers vs Hunger explains that it is a friendly competition between healthcare workers and friends that was started to help relieve food insecurity during the COVID-19 pandemic.

"The competition is meant to spur healthy competition between teams with a goal of maximizing contributions to food banks and other organizations fighting hunger," the website states. "You choose where to donate, and none of the money goes to or through us, so that you retain complete control over your donation."

The social media-focused effort has since grown, adding teenage volunteers in 2021, and raising more money in its third year of competition in 2022 than in the previous 2 years combined, according to the website. The total raised in 2024 was nearly $750,000.

On Wednesday afternoon, the HCWvsHunger account on X , "It's tiiiiiime!!! The final results of the 2024 #HCWvsHunger competition have been confirmed & certified! Most exciting: #MedTwitter & supporters have raised a total of $3,155,425 to fight #FoodInsecurity since the first annual competition in 12/20!"

In the lead-up to this year's tally, social media posts included those from Kelli Dominick, MD, PhD, , "Food fuels more than bodies -- it powers minds. Every meal matters for kids, families, and communities. Let's finish strong in the #HCWvsHunger Challenge! Support #BrainDocsUnite."

A post from Ann-Marie Brown, PhD, a nurse practitioner, , "We are competitive as teams, but we are all focused on this opportunity to feed folks who can not reliably obtain food that most of us take for granted."

Fumiko Ladd Chino, MD, , "You guys. We did it. $3 million dollars over the last 5 years. Thanks a lot of hungry people fed from #HCWvsHunger. Thank you Dr @acweyand @tmprowell for bringing us all together."

As for next year, the competition dates haven't yet been set. However, there are plans to do the competition each year, and it normally runs November to December.

To donate, the website instructs interested parties to identify a local, national, or international food bank or hunger organization of their choice, give whatever they can afford, and screenshot their receipt.

麻豆传媒 reached out to Weyand and Prowell for comment on the competition and this year's efforts, but they were not immediately available.

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