1.
Evaluation of a nutrition intervention in adolescents of an urban area in Greece: short- and long-term effects of the VYRONAS study.
Mihas, C, Mariolis, A, Manios, Y, Naska, A, Arapaki, A, Mariolis-Sapsakos, T, Tountas, Y
Public health nutrition. 2010;(5):712-9
Abstract
OBJECTIVE To assess the short-term (15-d) and long-term (12-month) effects of a school-based health and nutrition education intervention on diet, nutrition intake and BMI. DESIGN The 12-week teacher-implemented intervention in combination with seminars organized for parents was aimed at improving children's diet and nutrition knowledge. The intervention took place between September 2007 and January 2008. The participants were randomized to two study groups, the intervention group (IG) and control group (CG), and were examined prior to the intervention on a variety of health knowledge, dietary, behavioural and anthropometric indices. The same measurements were collected 15 d and 1 year after the intervention. SETTING All high schools in Vyronas, a densely populated district of Athens, Greece. SUBJECTS The sample consisted of 191 students aged 12-13 years. RESULTS Twelve months after the intervention, the programme was effective in reducing various indices in the IG compared with baseline findings (BMI: 23.3 (sd 2.8) v. 24.0 (sd 3.1) kg/m2, P < 0.001; daily energy intake: 8112.4 (sd 1412.4) v. 8503.3 (sd 1419.3) kJ/d, P < 0.001; total fat intake: 31.3 (sd 4.4) v. 35.4 (sd 4.7) % of daily energy, P < 0.001). Except for BMI, decreases in the aforementioned indices were also observed 15 d after the intervention. In addition, students of the IG reduced their weekly consumption of red meat and non-home-made meals and increased their frequency of fruit and breakfast cereal consumption. CONCLUSIONS The beneficial effects of this nutrition education intervention among adolescents may highlight the potential of such programmes in the prevention of obesity.
2.
Health and nutrition education in primary schools of Crete: follow-up changes in body mass index and overweight status.
Kafatos, A, Manios, Y, Moschandreas, J, ,
European journal of clinical nutrition. 2005;(9):1090-2
Abstract
The current study examines the long-term effects of a school-based 'Health and Nutrition Education programme' on body mass index (BMI) changes and the prevalence of overweight. The intervention group consisted of all pupils registered in the first grade of two counties of the island of Crete in 1992, while all pupils registered in a third county formed the control group. For evaluation purposes, a representative sample was examined at baseline (1992) following the 6-y intervention (1998) and 4 y after the programme's cessation (2002). The data presented here are based on pupils with full anthropometrical data in all three examination periods (284 intervention group pupils and 257 control group pupils). Former intervention group pupils had lower average BMI (by 0.7 kg/m2, s.e. 0.28, P = 0.019) at the 10-y follow-up compared to the control group subjects, while no differences were detected in the prevalence of obesity between the two groups. The findings of the current study indicate that the beneficial effects of the programme on pupils' BMI continue, to an extent, 4 years after its cessation. However, the lack of significant differences in the prevalence of overweight between the two groups indicates that the effects of the intervention may not be equally distributed in the population, with greater effects in certain subgroups and less or none in others.