LA Sprouts: A garden/nutrition intervention to improve health for high-risk youth

描述（由申请人提供）：美国儿童肥胖问题的严重性要求为我国未来的健康和成功制定有效、创新的预防和干预策略。最近，有史以来第一个联邦特别工作组的成立开始解决这一儿童肥胖流行病，其中一个关键支柱是使健康食品更便宜，更容易为家庭所接受，并将园艺作为吸引公众的主要手段。然而，很少有精心设计的实验研究严格评估花园营养干预对肥胖和相关代谢紊乱的影响，特别是在高危青年人群中。我们最近开发并证明了在4 - 5年级学生中进行的为期12周的课后园艺/营养干预试点（“LA芽”）改善了膳食纤维和蔬菜摄入量，增加了对水果和蔬菜摄入量的偏好，提高了烹饪和园艺技能，并降低了超重学生的血压和体重增加率。然而，这项初步研究不是随机对照试验，而是在校外的一个社区花园进行的，其中包括最小的家长成分。鉴于支持联邦倡议的基于研究的试验的缺乏，有必要进行更多的研究。该项目的目标是扩展我们的LA芽菜试点研究，并开展一项基于学校花园的随机营养和园艺干预，利用课余时间的校园课程和周末在附近社区花园的家庭讲习班，以改善拉丁裔儿童（8-11岁）的饮食摄入量，减少肥胖和相关代谢紊乱。两个地区，每个地区有两所小学（总共400名3 -5年级学生，其中90%是拉丁裔）和一个参与的社区花园，将被随机分为：1)LA芽菜（12周的放学后园艺/营养课程+双月家庭工作坊；两所学校，n=200名学生）；对照组（延迟干预，两所学校，n=200名学生）。本项目将评估LA芽菜项目对饮食摄入和相关行为、肥胖和相关代谢紊乱的影响。我们假设参加LA芽菜的学生将消耗更多的水果和蔬菜，与对照组相比，他们对水果和蔬菜的偏好、动机和自我效能都有所增加，肥胖和代谢风险因素也有所减少。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The enormity of the problem of childhood obesity in the US requires that effective, innovative prevention and intervention strategies be developed for the future health and success of our Country. Recently, the formation of the first-ever federal task force began to address this childhood obesity epidemic, with one of the key pillars being making healthy foods more affordable and accessible for families, and uses gardening as a primary vehicle to engage the public. However, few well-designed experimental studies exist that rigorously evaluate the impact of garden-based nutrition interventions on obesity and related metabolic disorders specifically in high-risk youth populations. We recently developed and demonstrated that a pilot 12-week after-school gardening/nutrition intervention ("LA Sprouts") in 4th - 5th grade students improved dietary fiber and vegetable intake, increased preference for fruit and vegetable intake, improved cooking and gardening skills, and decreased blood pressure and rate of weight gain in overweight students. However, this pilot study was not a randomized controlled trial, was conducted off-campus at a community garden and included a minimal parental component. Given the paucity of research-based trials supporting the federal initiative, additional studies are warranted. The goal of this project is to extend our LA Sprouts pilot study, and conduct a school-garden-based randomized nutrition and gardening intervention, utilizing lessons on campus during after school hours and family workshops at nearby community gardens on weekends, to improve dietary intake and reduce obesity and related metabolic disorders in Latino children (ages 8-11 years). Two regions, each with two elementary schools (a total of 400 3rd-5th graders, >90% Latino) and a participating community garden will be randomized into either: 1) LA Sprouts (12-week after school gardening/nutrition classes + bi-monthly family workshops; two schools, n=200 students); or 2) Control (Delayed intervention; two schools, n=200 students). This project will assess the effects of the LA Sprouts program on dietary intake and related behaviors, and obesity and related metabolic disorders. We hypothesize that students participating in LA Sprouts will consume more fruits and vegetables, have increased preference, motivation, and self-efficacy to eat fruits and vegetables, and have reduced obesity and metabolic risk factors compared to controls.