Meal kits in the family setting: Impacts on family dynamics, nutrition, social and mental health.

Families face many barriers in providing nutritious home-cooked family meals. Meal kit subscription services are increasingly popular among families and may address obstacles to cooking at home and facilitate shared family meals. This study aimed to understand why families use meal kits and what they perceived to be the main impacts on family dynamics, nutrition, social and mental health. Sixteen primary meal providers with at least one child 18 years and under living at home, were recruited via social media (e.g., Facebook, Twitter) to participate in a semi-structured interview using Zoom videoconferencing. Interviews were conducted with participants who currently purchased and used commercially available meal kits in Australia (e.g., HelloFresh, Marley Spoon). Thematic analysis of interview transcripts revealed that women, as the primary carers responsible for family meals, primarily reported the role that meal kits played in reducing their mental load through reduced food-related decision making, enhanced family participation in meal preparation, and opportunities for food literacy. Additionally, meal kits were reported to reduce food eaten away-from-home with the majority of participants perceiving meal kits to provide nutritionally dense meals and appropriate portion sizes aligned with National dietary guidelines. This study provides important insights into the potential physical, mental and social health benefits of meal kits in supporting families to cook and eat meals together at home. While meal kits have the capacity to positively influence population health and wellbeing, it is necessary that meal kit subscription services address the nutritional quality of their meals and provide evidence-based nutrition messaging to facilitate improvements in food literacy and nutritional intake.

Feasibility of a culturally adapted early childhood obesity prevention program among migrant mothers in Australia: a mixed methods evaluation.

INTRODUCTION: Healthy Beginnings is an established nurse-led early childhood obesity prevention program that promotes healthy infant feeding practices and active play in the early years of life. To improve engagement with culturally and linguistically diverse populations, the Healthy Beginnings program delivered by telephone was culturally adapted and implemented with Arabic- and Chinese-speaking mothers in Sydney, Australia. The cultural adaptation process has been published separately. In this article, we aimed to evaluate the feasibility of the culturally adapted program. METHODS: In 2018-2019, the culturally adapted Healthy Beginnings program was implemented with Arabic- and Chinese-speaking women recruited from antenatal clinics in Sydney. At four staged timepoints (from third trimester until 6 months of age), mothers were sent culturally adapted health promotion booklets and text messages and offered four support calls from bi-cultural child and family health nurses in Arabic and Chinese. A mixed methods evaluation included a) baseline and 6-month telephone surveys, followed by b) semi-structured follow-up interviews with a subset of participating mothers and program delivery staff. Main outcomes of this feasibility study were reach (recruitment and retention), intervention dose delivered (number of nurse support calls completed) and acceptability (appropriateness based on cognitive and emotional responses). RESULTS: At recruitment, 176 mothers were eligible and consented to participate. Of 163 mothers who completed the baseline survey, 95% completed the program (n = 8 withdrew) and 83% completed the 6-month survey (n = 70 Arabic- and n = 65 Chinese-speaking mothers). Most mothers (n = 127, 78%) completed at least one nurse support call. The qualitative analysis of follow-up interviews with 42 mothers (22 Arabic- and 20 Chinese-speaking mothers) and 10 program delivery staff highlighted the perceived value of the program and the positive role of bi-cultural nurses and in-language resources. Mothers who completed more nurse support calls generally expressed greater acceptability. CONCLUSIONS: The culturally adapted Healthy Beginnings program was feasible to deliver and acceptable to Arabic- and Chinese-speaking mothers. Our results highlight the importance of in-language resources and individualised bi-cultural nurse support by telephone for supporting culturally and linguistically diverse migrant families with infant feeding and active play. These findings support the potential for program refinements and progression to an effectiveness trial.

The process of culturally adapting the Healthy Beginnings early obesity prevention program for Arabic and Chinese mothers in Australia.

BACKGROUND: Behavioural interventions for the early prevention of childhood obesity mostly focus on English-speaking populations in high-income countries. Cultural adaptation is an emerging strategy for implementing evidence-based interventions among different populations and regions. This paper describes the initial process of culturally adapting Healthy Beginnings, an evidence-based early childhood obesity prevention program, for Arabic and Chinese speaking migrant mothers and infants in Sydney, Australia. METHODS: The cultural adaptation process followed the Stages of Cultural Adaptation theoretical model and is reported using the Framework for Reporting Adaptations and Modifications-Enhanced. We first established the adaptation rationale, then considered program underpinnings and the core components for effectiveness. To inform adaptations, we reviewed the scientific literature and engaged stakeholders. Consultations included focus groups with 24 Arabic and 22 Chinese speaking migrant mothers and interviews with 20 health professionals. With input from project partners, bi-cultural staff and community organisations, findings informed cultural adaptations to the content and delivery features of the Healthy Beginnings program. RESULTS: Program structure and delivery mode were retained to preserve fidelity (i.e. staged nurse calls with key program messages addressing modifiable obesity-related behaviours: infant feeding, active play, sedentary behaviours and sleep). Qualitative analysis of focus group and interview data resulted in descriptive themes concerning cultural practices and beliefs related to infant obesity-related behaviours and perceptions of child weight among Arabic and Chinese speaking mothers. Based on the literature and local study findings, cultural adaptations were made to recruitment approaches, staffing (bi-cultural nurses and project staff) and program content (modified call scripts and culturally adapted written health promotion materials). CONCLUSIONS: This cultural adaptation of Healthy Beginnings followed an established process model and resulted in a program with enhanced relevance and accessibility among Arabic and Chinese speaking migrant mothers. This work will inform the future cultural adaptation stages: testing, refining, and trialling the culturally adapted Healthy Beginnings program to assess acceptability, feasibility and effectiveness.

PREMM: preterm early massage by the mother: protocol of a randomised controlled trial of massage therapy in very preterm infants.

BACKGROUND: Preterm infants follow an altered neurodevelopmental trajectory compared to their term born peers as a result of the influence of early birth, and the altered environment. Infant massage in the preterm infant has shown positive effects on weight gain and reduced length of hospital stay. There is however, limited current evidence of improved neurodevelopment or improved attachment, maternal mood or anxiety. The aim of this study is to investigate the effects of infant massage performed by the mother in very preterm (VPT) infants. Effects on the infant will be assessed at the electrophysiological, neuroradiological and clinical levels.  Effects on maternal mood, anxiety and mother-infant attachment will also be measured. METHODS/DESIGN: A randomised controlled trial to investigate the effect of massage therapy in VPT infants. Sixty VPT infants, born at 28 to 32 weeks and 6 days gestational age, who are stable, off supplemental oxygen therapy and have normal cranial ultrasounds will be recruited and randomised to an intervention (infant massage) group or a control (standard care) group. Ten healthy term born infants will be recruited as a reference comparison group. The intervention group will receive standardised massage therapy administered by the mother from recruitment, until term equivalent age (TEA). The control group will receive care as usual (CAU). Infants and their mothers will be assessed at baseline, TEA, 12 months and 24 months corrected age (CA), with a battery of clinical, neuroimaging and electrophysiological measures, as well as structured questionnaires, psychoanalytic observations and neurodevelopmental assessments. DISCUSSION: Optimising preterm infant neurodevelopment is a key aim of neonatal research, which could substantially improve long-term outcomes and reduce the socio-economic impact of VPT birth. This study has the potential to give insights into the mother-baby relationship and any positive effects of infant massage on neurodevelopment. An early intervention such as massage that is relatively easy to administer and could alter the trajectory of preterm infant brain development, holds potential to improve neurodevelopmental outcomes in this vulnerable population. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry: ACTRN12612000335897 . Date registered: 22/3/2012.

A snapshot of the scope of obesity prevention practice in Australia.

Community-based initiatives (CBIs) that build capacity and promote healthy environments hold promise for preventing obesity and non-communicable disease, however their characteristics remain poorly understood and lessons are learned in isolation. This limits understanding of likely effectiveness of CBIs; the potential for actively supporting practice; and the translation of community-based knowledge into policy. Building on an initial survey (2010), an online survey was launched (2013) with the aim to describe the reach and characteristics of Australian CBIs and identify and evaluate elements known to contribute to best practice, effectiveness and sustainability. Responses from 104 CBIs were received in 2013. Geographic location generally reflected population density in Australia. Duration of CBIs was short-term (median 3 years; range 0.2-21.0 years), delivered mostly by health departments and local governments. Median annual funding had more than doubled since the 2010 survey, but average staffing had not increased. CBIs used at least two strategy types, with a preference for individual behaviour change strategies. Targeting children was less common (31%) compared with the 2010 survey (57%). Logic models and theory were used in planning, but there was low use of research evidence and existing prevention frameworks. Nearly, all CBIs had an evaluation component (12% of budget), but dissemination was limited. This survey provides information on the scope and varied quality of the current obesity prevention investment in Australia. To boost the quality and effectiveness of CBIs, further support systems may be required to ensure that organizations adopt upstream, evidence-informed approaches; and integrate CBIs into systems, policies and environments.

Scaling up evidence-based digital early life nutrition interventions in a county setting: an implementation trial - protocol for Phase 2 of the Nutrition Now project.

Background: Few effective health interventions transition from smaller efficacy or effectiveness studies to real-world implementation at scale, representing a gap between evidence and practice. Recognising this, we have developed Nutrition Now - a tailored digital resource building on four efficacious dietary interventions, aiming to improve nutrition in the important first 1,000 days of life. Nutrition Now targets and guides expectant parents and parents of 0-2 year olds, serves as a reliable source of evidence-based information for midwives and public health nurses at maternal and child healthcare (MCH) centres, and offers pedagogical tools for early childhood education and care (ECEC) staff. The aim of this study is to implement Nutrition Now at scale and evaluate the impact of different sets of multifaceted implementation strategies on implementation outcomes. Methods: A quasi-experimental design with three study arms will be used, providing either low, medium or high implementation support, when rolled out in 50 municipalities in 2 counties in Norway. Nutrition Now will be implemented in MCH and ECEC settings and made available to expectant parents and parents of 0-2 year olds through social media and MCH. The implementation support builds on strategies described in the Expert Recommendations for Implementing Change (ERIC) implementation framework and is informed by dialogues with stakeholders. Impact of the different degree of implementation support will be assessed by examining reach, adoption, fidelity, and sustainability using usage data generated from the Nutrition Now resource, publicly available municipal data and qualitative interviews with MCH and ECEC staff. Discussion: Nutrition Now Phase 2 will break new ground by scaling up successively delivered and complementary dietary interventions in the first 1,000 days of life in a real-life context. The project also seeks to identify what level of implementation support is most effective when implementing digital, scalable, evidence-based early-life nutrition interventions in community settings. The project will inform implementation research and provide knowledge about effective implementation strategies to be used in a national scale-up of Nutrition Now. Trial registration: The study is registered prospectively (submitted 14/06/2022, registration date: 19/06/2022) in the International Standard Randomised Controlled Trial Number registry (ISRCTN): reg. Number: ISRCTN10694967, https://doi.org/10.1186/ISRCTN10694967.

Evaluating the effectiveness and implementation of evidence-based early-life nutrition interventions in a community setting a hybrid type 1 non-randomized trial - the Nutrition Now project protocol.

Disappointingly few efficacious health interventions are successfully scaled up and implemented in real world settings. This represents an evidence-to-practice gap, with loss of opportunity to improve practice. Aiming to improve nutrition in the first 1000 days of life, we have combined four efficacious dietary interventions into a single adapted digital resource (Nutrition Now) for implementation in a Norwegian community setting. Nutrition Now targets pregnant women and parents of 0-2-year-olds with messages focusing on healthy dietary behaviours. Early childhood education and care (ECEC) staff are provided with pedagogical tools addressing healthy food exposure and child food acceptance. Objectives: a) evaluate the effectiveness of provision of the Nutrition Now resource on child diet and diet-related outcomes, with special attention to the influence of socio-economic position, b) gather information on the effectiveness of the implementation process to inform forthcoming scale-up and c) perform trial- and model-based economic evaluations. This is a hybrid type 1 implementation study, focusing on evaluation of effectiveness. A quasi-experimental design with pre- and post-tests, where one municipality gets access to the resource (n~800), while a matched non-equivalent control municipality (n~800) does not, will be used. Effectiveness will be assessed by examining e.g., diet outcomes, developmental outcomes, and feeding practices. The resource will be implemented in ECEC settings and made available to pregnant women and parents through the Norwegian system of maternal and child health (MCH) care. The implementation process includes iterative adjustments and implementation strategies from the implementation framework Expert Recommendations for Implementing Change (ERIC) informed by dialogues with stakeholders. Implementation outcomes (e.g., acceptability and adoption) will be assessed through questionnaires and interviews with parents, ECEC and MCH staff, with particular attention to ethnic diverse groups. Both within-trial and modelling-based economic evaluation will be performed. Nutrition Now will bridge the existing evidence-to-practice gap through rigorous scientific effectiveness evaluation of municipal scale up and inform subsequent county scale up. The study is the first to implement efficacious nutrition interventions in early life with potential for health improvement using technology to maximise the reach and impact of both parental and MCH dietary guidance and ECEC practice. Clinical Trial Registration: https://www.isrctn.com/, identified ISRCTN10694967.

Navigating infant feeding supports after migration: Perspectives of Arabic and Chinese mothers and health professionals in Australia.

Optimal feeding practices can establish lifelong, transgenerational and global health benefits. Migration and cultural factors impact infant feeding practices and the support mothers receive for optimal infant feeding. This qualitative study explored support for infant feeding among Arabic and Chinese speaking migrant mothers in Australia. Semi-structured focus groups were conducted in language with 24 Arabic and 22 Chinese-Mandarin speaking migrant mothers with children under five years of age. Individual interviews were conducted in English with 20 health professionals working with Arabic or Chinese speaking migrant families. Data were thematically analysed using the framework method. Traditional family networks and trusted bi-cultural doctors were influential infant feeding supports for mothers. Health professionals perceived maternal and child health services to be poorly understood, and some mothers who accessed services felt they were not always culturally sensitive. Mothers sought additional information and support through online sources and peers. Both mothers and health professionals recognised the challenges of managing conflicting infant feeding advice and seeking best-practice support. The findings of this study highlight opportunities for health professionals to better support migrant mothers' infant feeding practices, for example through engaging families and working with doctors. There is a need for greater cultural sensitivity within maternal and child health services and culturally relevant programs to support healthy infant feeding practices among migrant communities.

The Environmental and Bitter Taste Endophenotype Determinants of Picky Eating in Australian School-Aged Children 7-12 years-A Cross-Sectional Pilot Study Protocol.

Caregivers' perceptions of children's pickiness are relatively scarce in relation to the five core food groups and their importance in providing a nutritionally balanced diet. Furthermore, there is no validated questionnaire that examines child-reported food preferences in an age-appropriate manner, and the use of terms such as a "picky eater" can be attributed to environmental and genetic factors. Despite potential links between children's food preferences and endophenotype bitter taste, associations between bitter taste sensitivity and picky eating is relatively unexplored. The proposed cross-sectional study aims to develop and validate a parent-reported core-food Picky Eating Questionnaire (PEQ) and child-reported Food Preference Questionnaire (C-FPQ) and simultaneously investigate environmental and phenotype determinants of picky eating. The study will be conducted in three stages: Phase 1, piloting PEQ and C-FPQ questionnaires (15-20 primary caregivers and their children aged 7-12 years); Phase 2 and 3, validating the revised questionnaires and evaluating the 6-n-propylthiouracil (PROP) bitter taste sensitivity to examine perception to bitter taste (369 primary caregivers and their children). Study findings will generate new validated tools (PEQ, C-FPQ) for use in evidence-based practice and research and explore picky eating as a behavioural issue via the potential genetic-phenotype basis of bitter taste sensitivity.

A map of community-based obesity prevention initiatives in Australia following obesity funding 2009-2013.

OBJECTIVE: Obesity is the single biggest public health threat to developed and developing economies. In concert with healthy public policy, multi-strategy, multi-level community-based initiatives appear promising in preventing obesity, with several countries trialling this approach. In Australia, multiple levels of government have funded and facilitated a range of community-based obesity prevention initiatives (CBI), heterogeneous in their funding, timing, target audience and structure. This paper aims to present a central repository of CBI operating in Australia during 2013, to facilitate knowledge exchange and shared opportunities for learning, and to guide professional development towards best practice for CBI practitioners. METHODS: A comprehensive search of government, non-government and community websites was undertaken to identify CBI in Australia in 2013. This was supplemented with data drawn from available reports, personal communication and key informant interviews. The data was translated into an interactive map for use by preventive health practitioners and other parties. RESULTS: We identified 259 CBI; with the majority (84%) having a dual focus on physical activity and healthy eating. Few initiatives, (n=37) adopted a four-pronged multi-strategy approach implementing policy, built environment, social marketing and/or partnership building. CONCLUSION: This comprehensive overview of Australian CBI has the potential to facilitate engagement and collaboration through knowledge exchange and information sharing amongst CBI practitioners, funders, communities and researchers. IMPLICATIONS: An enhanced understanding of current practice highlights areas of strengths and opportunities for improvement to maximise the impact of obesity prevention initiatives.

The process followed in the development of the paediatric food-based dietary guidelines for South Africa.

In 1996, a Food and Agricultural Organization/World Health Organization expert panel proposed the development of food-based dietary guidelines (FBDGs) that would be unique and specific to the needs of the populations of different countries. In 1997, a South African FBDG Working Group was initiated to develop a single set of FBDGs aimed at optimal nutrition for all South Africans older than 5 years. Thereafter, additional working groups investigated the development of FBDGs for specific priority groups including HIV/AIDS sufferers, the elderly, pregnant and lactating women and children under 5 years. This resulted in the formation of an expert paediatric FBDG Working Group in 2000, in Cape Town with the task to develop paediatric FBDGs (PFBDGs) for children younger than 5 years. However, it was decided to raise the 5-year-age limit to 7 years, which corresponds to one of the recommended dietary allowance (RDA) cut-offs for both genders and that would cover most pre-schoolers. Ultimately, three age subcategories were identified for developing specific PFBDGs, i.e. 0-6 months, 6-12 months and 12-84 months. In May 2003, after thorough review of the relevant literature, discussions with various stakeholders and pre-testing for comprehensibility, a set of preliminary PFBDGs for each of the subcategories was approved by the Working Group to be subjected to consumer testing. The proposed guidelines were considered to be the most appropriate ones for each age group, based on scientific and local evidence, and were evaluated utilizing qualitative methodologies. The results of these data are presented and discussed below. However, further testing is required for the diverse groups in the country.