Health Briefs

By Kacie Schumann, Health Promotion Coordinator, kacie.schumann@cityofames.org and Mikaylah Grundtner, Health Promotion Intern, mikaylah.grundtner@cityofames.org

It's that Time of Year!

Getting your annual flu and COVID-19 shots are a quick, easy way to keep our City workspaces healthier. Fewer respiratory illnesses can mean fewer missed workdays and disruptions for you, your team, and the people we serve every day.

The Health Promotion Program offers two convenient ways for you (and even your family members!) to get these annual shots: onsite clinics and walk in options at area pharmacies.

Why do we coordinate these options for vaccines? We’re able to negotiate lower vaccine costs than what the City may pay through a healthcare provider’s office, helping us manage the costs of our self-funded health plan. Keeping healthcare costs down can help reduce pressure on future health insurance premiums. At the same time, bringing vaccines directly to employees makes getting vaccinated more convenient and accessible. It’s a win-win!

If you are interested in attending onsite vaccine clinics, the schedule will be as follows:

Registration links: Coming soon! Watch your City email!

If the onsite option doesn’t work for your schedule, you can do a walk in at a local pharmacy beginning Oct 1. For walk in options, you can go to any of the three Ames HyVee Pharmacies or Medicap Pharmacy during their open business hours. No appointment is necessary, just mention that you are a City employee (or spouse/dependent). You may be asked to identify yourself as a City member by providing a City ID badge or City health insurance card (the shot will not be run through insurance and you will not be charged anything). 

If you have any questions, please contact Health Promotion Coordinator Kacie Schumann at kacie.schumann@cityofames.org or 515-239-5354.

Looking for more information on vaccine recommendations for different age groups? Check out some of these resources below:

American Academy of Pediatrics

American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists

American Academy of Family Physicians

Infectious Diseases Society of America

Fall Semester Health Promotion Happenings

Read on to see what’s happening in the world of health promotion during the Fall 2026 semester! More details to come (including registration) for all of these events.

September

• Sept. 22-23: Mental Health First Aid – register on our EDC portal here
  
  
  

September-October

• Onsite influenza & COVID-19 vaccines
  • Sept. 30: 6:30-8 a.m. at Public Works Operations/Fleet
  • Oct. 2: 8 a.m.-noon at City Hall
  • Oct. 9: 1-5 p.m. at City Hall
  • Oct. 10: 1-3 p.m. at the Water Treatment Plant
    • Family Day! Bring your spouses & dependents! 

October

• Oct. 1 – Walk in influenza & COVID-19 vaccines open for the year (HyVee & Medicap Pharmacies)
• Oct. 5 - NEW Sleep Challenge starts!
• Oct. 7 – Healthiest State Walk, noon – meet outside the front of City Hall for a short walk around downtown Ames!
• Oct. 14 – Blood Drive  

November

• Nov. 10 – Healthy Meal Prep Workshop  
• Nov. 16 – Smart Holiday Challenge starts

December

• Dec. 1-2 – Mental Health First Aid – register on our EDC portal here

Portion Sizes 101

Beginners Guide to Portion Size

Portion size, as defined by the American Heart Association, is the amount of food you put on your plate and eat. This is not the same as serving size, though the two are often used interchangeably. Serving sizes are set by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and can be found in bold text at the top of every nutrition label. Serving sizes can be a helpful tool in deciding what an appropriate portion size would look like for you based on your specific calorie needs. Still, many people find it confusing to figure out how much they should be eating to maintain a healthy body composition.

1. Why is choosing the correct portion size so confusing?

In the US, there are not very many good examples of what a “healthy” amount of food looks like. For example, the nutrition label on most boxes of pasta states that a regular serving size is 1 cup of cooked noodles. However, head over to the Olive Garden and a standard entree of spaghetti contains roughly 4 to 4.5 cups of cooked noodles. Because of the gross misrepresentation of portion sizes at restaurants, perceptions of how much food it is appropriate to consume at one time can be heavily skewed.

2. How can I use the nutrition label to create an appropriate portion size?

The biggest thing most people tend to look out for when it comes to deciding their portion size is the calories. The calories for a single serving of a product are listed in an enlarged bold font directly underneath the serving size information. Depending on your individual calorie needs you may choose to consume more, less, or the same amount of food suggested in the serving size. To get a better idea of how many calories you should consume, you can use an online caloric intake calculator like the one linked here.

Another factor when deciding how much food to consume is macronutrients and micronutrients. This information is listed under the calories on the nutrition label and is measured in either grams or milligrams. There is also a percentage associated with each nutrient which denotes how much of your daily value is contained in one serving of the food. It is important to note that these values are calculated from a standard 2,000 calorie per day diet, so if your daily calorie intake is different, these percentages will not be accurate.

3. Are there any tips on controlling portion sizes when cooking at home?

Yes! When cooking at home, a helpful strategy is to provide each member of the family with one serving that is appropriate to their age and activity level and then immediately put the leftover food away and save it for leftovers. This helps reduce overconsumption due to taking second and third helpings. Another tip that is helpful for sticking to the correct portion size is eating at a slower pace. In today’s society we are always on the go, which can sometimes mean rushed mealtimes. For normal individuals it takes about 20 minutes for the “fullness hormone” leptin to get from our stomach to our brain. When we eat too quickly, we outpace this hormone. This causes us to not realize we have reached fullness, so we keep eating until that signal finally comes through, but by that time it is too late and we have already overeaten.

4. Is there anything I can do while eating out?

This one is a little trickier, but there are still things you can do to avoid overeating. First, try skipping the appetizers, or only having one piece of bread at your favorite Italian restaurant. These types of dishes are marketed to you as “starters”, “light bites”, or something similar so that you don’t feel like that food really counts as part of your meal, when in reality it counts just as much as your actual entree. Second, you could split a dish with someone else. As previously mentioned, chain restaurants can have extreme portion sizes, so splitting a dish is a good option for both your stomach and your checkbook! If you happen to be eating out alone, a good alternative to splitting your dish with someone else is asking for a to-go box right away and putting half of the food into it to save for later.

5. General Rule of Thumb

If you are preparing a meal on the go or in a short amount of time and don’t have time for measuring or weighing out food, there is a simple way to tell the correct amount of a given food using just your hand!

• Protein (meat, fish, and poultry): The size of the palm of your hand

• Carbohydrates (rice, pasta, grains): The size of a clenched fist

• Fruits & Vegetables: Two cupped hands together; aim to fill half your plate!

• Fats (butter, oil, mayo): The size of your thumb tip

• Dairy (cheese): The size of your whole thumb

• Snacks: The size of one cupped hand

6. Wrapping Up

Picking out and sticking to a good portion size for you can be challenging, or even a little intimidating. With how large restaurant portion sizes are, it’s difficult to unlearn what we think a portion of food should look like. The nutrition label on a box of food is a great place to start to get a better idea of how much of a certain food is recommended, and how that fits into your unique calorie needs. Portion control doesn’t have to be confusing!

High Protein Cookie Dough Bites

Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour 

• ¼ cup packed light brown sugar 

• 3 Tbsp. nut butter 

• 2 Tbsp. unsalted butter, melted 

• 1 tsp. pure vanilla extract 

• ½ cup vanilla or unflavored protein powder 

• 1 Tbsp. whole milk 

• ¼ tsp. kosher salt 

• ¼ cup mini chocolate chips 

• Food thermometer 

Instructions 

1. In a small bowl, microwave flour in 15-second increments, stirring between each, until a thermometer inserted into the center of the flour reads 160 degrees, 45 to 60 seconds total. 

1. In a large bowl, using a spatula, stir brown sugar, nut butter, butter, and vanilla. Add flour, protein powder, milk, and salt and mix until the dough forms. Stir in chocolate chips.  

1. Scoop out 1 ½ Tbsp. portions of dough and roll into balls. Place on a parchment-lined backing sheet and refrigerate until chilled, at least 30 minutes.  

1. Cookie dough bites will stay good for 1 week in an airtight container kept in the refrigerator.