Plant-based food packages linked to lower BMI in children: Research

Adopting a “food is medicine” approach can improve nutritional security for families, as well as decrease children’s body mass index (BMI), according to a new study by researchers at Mass General Brigham Hospital System. Can Researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital and Boston Children’s Hospital examined whether giving weekly plant-based foods to families requesting food assistance during the pandemic changed children’s weight.

The team found an association between increased receipt of food packages and decreased BMI. The findings, published in the journal Preventing Chronic Disease, add to growing evidence that providing plant-based foods may be a useful strategy for preventing childhood obesity among children from food-insecure families. Senior author Lauren Fichtner, MD, MPH, said, “Encouraging healthy eating habits during childhood is important to help prevent co-morbidities associated with obesity later in life, but many families do not have access to expensive healthy foods.” materials, such as produce.” director of the Pediatric Nutrition Center at Mass General for Children and Health and research advisor at The Greater Boston Food Bank. “Having food pantries like MGH Revere that can provide families with healthy food is a huge help in ensuring that children have long, healthy futures and have the best heart and metabolic health possible from an early age.”

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Food insecurity in the United States increased by 55% in 2020, affecting 42% of households with children. This increase was driven by a number of factors, such as the economic impact of the pandemic, school closures and disruptions to food supply chains. As food insecurity increased, so did the prevalence of childhood obesity, rising from 19.3% to 22.4% between August 2019 and August 2020.
The challenge for families facing food insecurity is usually the quality of food as well as the quantity of food.

“Children in food-insecure families often skip meals or don’t eat for an entire day because their families don’t have enough money for food,” Fichtner said. “One way for parents to stretch their limited food budget and ensure that their children are eating at least something is to buy the cheapest foods available, which are often not nutritious and can lead to obesity and other health problems.” contribute.”
To help mitigate the impact of food insecurity related to the pandemic on childhood obesity, the MGH Revere Food Pantry provided weekly plant-based food packages to families seeking food assistance. The packages included fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts and whole grains, and were adjusted according to family size to provide enough for three meals per day for each member of the household. Between January 1, 2021 and February 1, 2022, 107 children from 93 families received weekly food packages, an average of about 27 packages per family for the entire study period.

Food packages were provided 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 healthy food and nutrition education to families in the Greater Boston area since opening its doors in 2020.

Study co-author Jacob Mirsky, MD, MA, DipABLM, medical director, said, “For dozens of families, the MGH Revere Food Pantry was a real lifeline during the pandemic by providing free weekly packages of healthy food for the whole family. ” MGH Revere Food Pantry. The researchers examined BMI during the baseline period before receiving the food packages and again during the follow-up period using Mass General Brigham electronic health records. At the start of the study, 57% of the study children aged 2–18 years had a BMI at or above the 85th percentile. At follow-up, this number dropped to 49%. The researchers observed a decrease in BMI with each additional food family package and estimated that children in households that received 27 weeks or more of the package could have a reduction in BMI of 1.08 kg/m2 or more.

While the study focused specifically on the pandemic, the research suggests that these findings may serve as future strategies for addressing broader issues of food insecurity.

First author Allison Wu said, “Providing these food packages to support families during the pandemic had an immediate value, but we also enabled families and children to make healthier food choices, which we know are important when children It’s important to introduce them when they’re small.” MD MPH, attending physician in pediatric gastroenterology, hepatology and nutrition at Boston Children’s Hospital. Wu is a research associate and former research fellow in the Harvard-wide Pediatric Health Services Research Program. “This type of support is important not only for their BMI in childhood, but also in informing how they make food choices and influencing what foods their families serve to them to promote overall health.” preparing.”

This research, as well as the MGH Revere Food Pantry, are part of a larger Mass General Brigham ‘food as medicine’ strategy. In collaboration with the 2022 White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health, Mass General Brigham will promote nutrition equity and security, support food as medicine programs to combat diet-related diseases, and promote food-related awareness in the local community. Committed $8.4 million to fund programming. Organization based throughout Massachusetts.