Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Randomized Controlled Trial
. 2023 Dec;26(12):3122-3133.
doi: 10.1017/S1368980023002136. Epub 2023 Oct 13.

Evaluation of a menu box delivery service for Australian long-day care services to improve food provision and child intake: a cluster randomised controlled trial

Shabnam Kashef  1 , Lucinda K Bell  1 , Victoria Brown  2 , Claire Gardner  1 , Dorota Zarnowiecki  1 , Samantha Morgillo  1 , Jennifer C Arguelles  3 , David N Cox  4 , Rebecca K Golley  1
Affiliations
Randomized Controlled Trial

Evaluation of a menu box delivery service for Australian long-day care services to improve food provision and child intake: a cluster randomised controlled trial

Shabnam Kashef et al. Public Health Nutr. 2023 Dec.

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the impact of a menu box delivery service tailored to the long-day care (LDC) setting on improving menu compliance with recommendations, children's diet quality and dietary intake while in care.

Design: A cluster randomised controlled trial in LDC centres randomly assigned to an intervention (menu box delivery) or comparison (menu planning training) group. The primary outcome was child food provision and dietary intake. Secondary outcomes include menu compliance and process evaluation, including acceptability, fidelity and menu cost (per child, per day).

Setting: South Australian LDC centres.

Participants: Eight LDC centres (n 224 children) provided data.

Results: No differences were observed in serves/d between intervention and comparison centres, for provision (intervention, 0·9 inter-quartile range (IQR) 0·7-1·2; comparison, 0·8 IQR 0·5-1·3) or consumption (intervention, 0·5 IQR 0·2-0·8; comparison, 0·5 IQR 0·3-0·9) of vegetables. Child food provision and dietary intake were similar across both groups for all food groups (P < 0·05). At follow-up, all intervention centres met menu planning guidelines for vegetables, whereas only one comparison centre met guidelines. Intervention centre directors found the menu box delivery more acceptable than cooks. Cost of the intervention was AUD$2·34 greater than comparison centres (intervention, AUD$4·62 (95 % CI ($4·58, $4·67)); comparison, AUD$2·28 (95 % CI ($2·27, $2·30)) per child, per day).

Conclusions: Menu compliance can be improved via a menu delivery service, delivering equivalent impacts on child food provision and dietary intake compared with an online training programme. Further exploration of cooks acceptability and cost is essential before scaling up to implementation.

Keywords: Childcare; Children; Diet; Food environments; Preschool; Public health.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

There are no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Intervention flow and data collection points.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
CONSORT flow diagram of centres and children through the study.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Birch LL & Fisher JO (1998) Development of eating behaviors among children and adolescents. Pediatrics 101, 539–549. - PubMed
    1. Hendrie GA, Lease HJ, Bowen J et al. (2017) Strategies to increase children’s vegetable intake in home and community settings: a systematic review of literature. Matern Child Nutr 13, e12276. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Wang Y, Bentley ME, Zhai F et al. (2002) Tracking of dietary intake patterns of Chinese from childhood to adolescence over a 6-year follow-up period. J Nutr 132, 430–438. - PubMed
    1. Lynch J & Smith GD (2005) A life course approach to chronic disease epidemiology. Annu Rev Public Health 26, 1–35. - PubMed
    1. Ness AR, Maynard M, Frankel S et al. (2005) Diet in childhood and adult cardiovascular and all cause mortality: the Boyd Orr cohort. Heart 91, 894–898. - PMC - PubMed

Publication types