A national evaluation of school breakfast clubs: evidence from a cluster randomized controlled trial and an observational analysis.
Child Care Health Dev
; 30(5): 413-27, 2004 Sep.
Article
en En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-15320919
ABSTRACT
STUDY OBJECTIVE:
To measure the health, educational and social impacts of breakfast club provision in schools serving deprived areas across England.DESIGN:
A cluster randomized controlled trial and an observational analysis.SETTING:
England, the UK. INTERVENTION funding to establish a school-based breakfast club vs. control (no funding). MAINRESULTS:
Intention to treat analysis showed improved concentration (Trail Making Test Part A) amongst the intervention group at 3 months. Fewer pupils within the intervention group reported having skipped classes within the last month and fewer pupils within the intervention group reported having skipped 1 or more days of school within the last month at 1 year. Observational analysis at 1 year showed a higher proportion of primary-aged breakfast club attendees reported eating fruit for breakfast in comparison to non-attendees. A higher proportion of breakfast club attendees had borderline or abnormal conduct and total difficulties scores (primary-aged pupils) and prosocial score (secondary-aged pupils).CONCLUSIONS:
Analyses revealed a mixed picture of benefit and apparent disbenefit. This study illustrated the challenges of evaluating a complex intervention in which the evaluators had less control than is usual in randomized trials over recruitment, eligibility checking and implementation. If the impact of new policy initiatives is to be assessed using the most robust forms of evaluation, social policy needs to be organized so that evaluations can be constructed as experiments. This is likely to prove most difficult where the perceived value of implementing an intervention rapidly is high.
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Colección:
01-internacional
Base de datos:
MEDLINE
Asunto principal:
Instituciones Académicas
/
Servicios de Alimentación
Tipo de estudio:
Clinical_trials
Límite:
Child
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
País/Región como asunto:
Europa
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Child Care Health Dev
Año:
2004
Tipo del documento:
Article
País de afiliación:
Reino Unido