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. 2023 Jan 22;15(3):580.
doi: 10.3390/nu15030580.

Improvement of Dietary Habits among German Medical Students by Attending a Nationwide Online Lecture Series on Nutrition and Planetary Health ("Eat This!")

Anna Helbach  1   2 , Moritz Dumm  3 , Katharina Moll  4 , Tim Böttrich  5 , Can Gero Leineweber  6 , Wiebke Mueller  7 , Jan Matthes  3 , Maria Cristina Polidori  8   9
Affiliations

Improvement of Dietary Habits among German Medical Students by Attending a Nationwide Online Lecture Series on Nutrition and Planetary Health ("Eat This!")

Anna Helbach et al. Nutrients. .

Abstract

Nutrition is a major influential factor in optimizing human health and environmental sustainability. Medical students often do not follow national dietary guideline recommendations. Raising awareness of a healthy lifestyle is important as physicians with healthy lifestyle behaviors are more likely to counsel on nutrition. Our study aims to evaluate a Germany-wide online lecture series on nutritional medicine, "Eat This!". Before and after the course, 520 medical students who participated and 64 who did not participate in the course (comparison group) filled out an online survey. To assess the students' dietary habits, a validated FFQ was used. According to this questionnaire, only 31% of the lecture participants consumed enough fruits and 24% consumed enough vegetables, while almost half of the students exceeded the recommended maximum amount of crisps and sweets. After attending the lecture series, guideline adherence with respect to fruits and vegetables showed a significant increase, as did awareness of healthy nutrition and percentage of students with low-risk lifestyle habits. Our results show that low-threshold approaches, such as "Eat This!", can positively influence the dietary behaviors and lifestyle habits of medical students. This can help future doctors fulfill their role in the fight against the global burden of non-communicable diseases.

Keywords: behavioral change; diet quality; dietary guidelines; medical students; medical training; nutrition surveys; nutritional medicine; planetary health.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Flowchart of study participants. * p < 0.05.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Mean dietary quality score of the lecture participants and the comparison group at pre-course (T0) and post-course (T1). Level of significance of observed differences between pre- to post-course as assessed by Wilcoxon signed-rank test, respectively: ns = not significant, p > 0.05; *** p < 0.001. Whiskers go from min. to max.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Percentage of the lecture participants’ food intake in relation to the national guideline recommendations at pre-course (T0) and post-course (T1). Level of significance of observed differences in consumption in gram per day or per week for each food group between pre- to post-course as assessed by Wilcoxon signed-rank test, respectively: ns = not significant, p > 0.05; * p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Percentage of lecture participants with low-risk lifestyle habits at pre- and post-course.Level of significance of observed differences between pre- to post-course as assessed by McNemar test, respectively: ns = not significant, p > 0.05; * p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01. Healthy BMI = BMI between 18.5 and 24.9 kg/m2; DQS = dietary quality score; HLI ≥ 4 = low-risk lifestyle habits in at least 4 of 5 lifestyle categories.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Comparison of median Healthy Food Awareness and Personal Responsibility among the lecture participants from pre- to post-course. Level of significance of observed differences between pre- and post-course as assessed by Wilcoxon signed-rank test, respectively: *** p < 0.001.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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