Impact of a Novel Multicomponent Nutrition Program on Diet Consumption among Preschool Children

ABSTRACT

Aim

This study aims to evaluate the impact of a novel multicomponent nutrition education program (United for Healthier Kids; U4HK) on the diet consumed during school lunch among preschool children.

Methods

The program comprised four tools: hero plates, hero content, hero menus, and hero books and stickers. The program was implemented for 16 weeks. Food consumption and the quality of the menus were examined pre- and post-intervention.

Results

The lunch nutrient profiling scores for fat and vitamin C improved from moderate (9.95) to good (10.87) and moderate (9.50) to very good (13.83), respectively. Vegetable and fruit consumption also increased significantly by 127.2% (6.0 (3.2, 12.9) grams to 13.7 (6.7, 18.9) grams, p<0.001) and 44.8% (8.1 (3.9, 12.4) grams to 11.7 (5.4, 21.8) grams, p<0.001), respectively. Compared to those in the Thai school lunch guidelines, the percentages of vegetable and fruit consumed increased by 16.0% (12.1% (6.4, 25.9) to 28.1% (13.4, 43.4)) and 8.8% (14.0% (6.8, 28.3) to 22.8% (8.5, 33.4)), respectively. Energy, carbohydrate, and fat intake increased significantly by 13.2% (179.1 (137.9, 220.8) to 202.7 (163.0, 243.2) kcal), 18.9% (18.1 (14.3, 21.7) to 21.6 (17.2, 25.6) grams), and 23.2% (6.7 (4.9, 9.9) to 8.2 (6.7, 10.2) grams), respectively.

Conclusions

The U4HK program adopted all aspects that foster healthy eating, including a healthy environment, an attractive role model and increased repeatability of the exposure to healthy foods.

KEYWORDS:

• Children
• community health
• health promotion
• public health nutrition

Acknowledgements

We would like to extend our sincere gratitude to the teachers, parents and caregivers who participated in this study. We also appreciate the valuable and constructive comments received from the experts of the network of the United for Healthier Kids program (U4HK).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Conflict of interest

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.

Consent for Publication

All authors agreed to the submission and approved the final version of the manuscript. All authors agreed with the manuscript and declare that the content has not been published elsewhere.

Ethical Approval

The study was approved by the Ethical Review Committee for Research Involving Human Research Subjects, Health Science Group, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand. Written informed consent was obtained from all parents or child caregivers prior to enrolment in the study. The anonymity of the participants was preserved.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the United for Healthier Kids program, the Nestlé (Thai) Ltd. and the Medical Food Research Group, Chulalongkorn University.

Notes on contributors

Sapwarobol Suwimol

Sapwarobol Suwimol were responsible for the study concept and design, recruitment of volunteers, data collection, and interpretation of the results. Sapwarobol Suwimol supervised the study, performed a critical revision of the manuscript for important intellectual content, and contributed to the writing of the final manuscript.

Tirapongporn Hataichanok

Tirapongporn Hataichanok were responsible for the study concept and design, recruitment of volunteers, data collection, and interpretation of the results. Sapwarobol Suwimol supervised the study, performed a critical revision of the manuscript for important intellectual content, and contributed to the writing of the final manuscript.