Funded Projects

Recipes for Community Health

Project Year

2023

City & State

Washington, District of Columbia

Program Name

CATCH Resident

Topic

Nutrition

Program Description

Problem: There are known health disparities in the District of Columbia (D.C.) regarding childhood obesity and nutritional access. Children from historically marginalized communities in D.C. have higher rates of nutritional insecurity and comorbid chronic health conditions such as obesity; rates that are some of the highest in our country (1,2). In our primary care clinic in D.C., children of all age groups self-report intake of calorie-dense and nutritionally deficient foods. For example, a teenager with obesity reported eating take-out food for dinner multiple times per week. Another elementary school child reported eating one serving of vegetables once weekly. While produce distribution itself can address nutritional insecurity and healthy food access, there is evidence that adding nutritional education as an adjunct to food distribution encourages habit formation around healthy eating and retention of nutrition concepts (3). We aim to provide children and families with an engaging recipe and activity book along with fresh produce to support easier access to and more engagement around healthy foods. Primary Setting: The project will be based at three main sites in D.C.: a neighborhood farmer’s market and a primary care clinic in Ward 1 and a public charter school in Ward 8. These settings were chosen as they are within neighborhoods in D.C. that have high rates of obesity, nutritional insecurity, and are where children from historically underserved and immigrant communities reside. Number of Children Affected: In the District of Columbia, almost half of all households with children experienced food insecurity in 2022 (4). When these findings are combined with the most recent census data, we can estimate that approximately 60,000 children in D.C. experience food insecurity (5). In addition, 19.5% of children and adolescents in D.C. are considered obese by body mass index (BMI), which is around 130,000 children (5,6). Project Goal: For children and their families to learn about and participate in healthy eating through combining direct produce distribution with a bilingual, recipe and activity book. Proposed Intervention: We will create and distribute a bilingual recipe and curriculum-based activity book in conjunction with a bag of fresh fruits and vegetables at three sites in the District of Columbia: a clinic-based food pharmacy at the Children’s National Columbia Heights primary care clinic, the Columbia Heights neighborhood FRESHFARM farmer’s Market, and at a District of Columbia public charter school in Anacostia. Trained residents will work through one activity module and recipe within the book on site with parents and children and talk about the produce in items in their take home bag. At the farmer’s market site, we will also demonstrate one of the recipes within the book. Children will then take the activity book and produce home and be incentivized to learn and complete activities and recipes in the book at their own pace through an integrated sticker chart, narrative storytelling, and compelling graphics. Parents will be recruited for a post-intervention survey via a quick response (QR) code within the activity book to provide demographic information as well as to assess the effectiveness of the intervention. Anticipated Outcomes: We hope to distribute 200 books and produce bags via two events at a D.C. public charter school, two FRESHFARM farmer’s market events, and four events at the Children’s National Columbia Heights primary care clinic. We hope in our post-intervention survey that there will be a self-reported increase in children’s intake of fruits and vegetables and nutritional knowledge. In addition, we hope that the post-intervention survey and in person conversations with families at these sites will provide us with qualitative data on the impact of direct produce distribution programs on family’s experiences with food insecurity.

Project Goal

The project goal is for children and their families to learn about and participate in healthy eating through combining direct produce distribution with a bilingual, recipe and activity book.

Project Objective 1

Objective one is for the primary grantee to adapt evidence-based nutritional information and recipes with assistance from our community partners to create a bilingual (Spanish and English) activity and recipe book that we will use as the curriculum for our nutritional teaching at community sites. The book will contain 10 activity modules on nutrition and healthy eating and 10 recipes and will be finished within the first two months of the project.

Project Objective 2

Objective two is for the resident team to teach our nutritional curriculum from the activity and recipe book to 200 children in six months while distributing 200 bags of fresh produce at two sessions at our DC Public Charter School partner, two sessions at the Columbia Heights Farmer’s Market, and four sessions at the food pharmacy at the Children’s National Columbia Heights primary care clinic.

Project Objective 3

Objective three is to have ten or more families who participate in our food distribution and nutritional curriculum sessions complete our post-session survey by the end of the grant year.

AAP District

District III

Institutional Name

Children's National Hospital

Contact 1

Nicole Du