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Taking a “food is medicine” approach, according to a new study led by experts at the Mass General Brigham Hospital System, can increase families’ food security while simultaneously lowering the number of children. body mass index (BMI). Researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital and Boston Children’s Hospital explored whether providing weekly plant-based snacks to families seeking nutritional assistance during the pandemic affected children’s weight.
The team found an association between increased food package reception and lower body mass index. The findings, published in the journal Preventing Chronic Disease, add to a growing body of evidence that offering plant-based foods can be a useful disease prevention strategy. Childhood obesity in children from food insecure families.
“It is important to encourage healthy eating habits during childhood to help prevent obesity-related joint diseases later in life, but many families do not have access to expensive healthy foods, such as produce,” said lead researcher Lauren Fichtner, MD. , MPH, director of the Children’s Nutrition Center at Mass General for Children and health and research advisor at The Greater Boston Food Bank. “Food pantries like MGH Revere that can provide families with healthy foods are a huge help in making sure that children have a long, healthy future and have the best cardiovascular health.” Metabolic health Possible from a young age.” Food insecurity increased by 55% in the United States in 2020, affecting 42% of families with children. This increase was driven by a variety of factors, such as the economic effects of the pandemic, school closures, and disruptions to supply chains With food insecurity on the rise, so has the prevalence of childhood obesity, increasing from 19.3% to 22.4% between August 2019 and August 2020.
For families dealing with food insecurity, the challenge is usually as much food quality as quantity.
“Children in food-insecure families often skip meals or skip meals for a whole day because their family doesn’t have enough money for food,” Fichtner said. “One way parents can stretch a tight food budget and make sure their kids are eating at least something is to buy the cheapest foods available, which are often not nutritious and contribute to obesity and other health problems.” To help mitigate the effects of pandemic-related food insecurity on childhood obesity, the MGH Revere Food Pantry offers weekly Vegetarian food Packages for families seeking food assistance. The packages contained fresh fruits, vegetables, nuts, and whole grains, and were adjusted to family size to provide enough for three meals a day for each family member. Between January 1, 2021, and February 1, 2022, 107 children from 93 families received weekly food packages, an average of 27 packages per family over the entire study period.
The food packages were offered by the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Revere Food Pantry, a partnership between MGH and The Greater Boston Food Bank. The MGH Revere Food Pantry has provided health food and nutrition education to families in the Greater Boston area since it opened its doors in 2020.
“For dozens of families, the MGH Revere Food Pantry has been a real lifeline during… pandemic By providing free weekly packages of healthy food to the entire family,” said study co-author Jacob Mirsky, MD, MA, DipABLM, medical director of the MGH Revere Food Pantry.
The researchers examined body mass index during a baseline period before receiving the food packages and then during a follow-up period using the Mass General Brigham’s electronic health record. At study start, 57% of the children in the study ages 2-18 had a BMI at or above the 85th percentile. At follow-up, this number was reduced to 49%. The researchers also observed a decrease in BMI with each additional food package the family received, and estimated that children in families who received 27 weeks or more of the packages might have a decrease in BMI of 1.08 kg/m2 or more.
While the study focused specifically on the epidemic, the research indicates that these findings can carry over into strategies to address broader issues of food insecurity in the future.
“There was immediate value to providing these food packages to support families during the pandemic, but we also enabled families and children to make healthy food choices, which we know is important to offer when children are young,” said first author Alison Wu. Master of Public Health, MD, attending pediatric gastroenterology, hepatology, and nutrition at Boston Children’s Hospital. Wu is a research collaborator and former research fellow in the Harvard-wide Children’s Health Services Research Program. “This kind of support is not only important for childhood BMI, but also for letting them know how to choose foods and influencing the foods their families prepare for them to promote overall health.”
This research, along with the MGH Revere food pantry, is part of General Brigham’s’ larger “food as medicine” strategy. In conjunction with the 2022 White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, Mass General Brigham and General Brigham pledged $8.4 million to advance nutrition equality and security, and to support food as medical programs to address Diet related diseasesand funding food-related programs at local community organizations throughout Massachusetts.
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