[Evaluating the dietary quality of 454 rural elderly aged 65 years and above in Luzhou City in 2023].

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the dietary quality of the rural elderly aged 65 years and above. METHODS: In February-March 2023, a convenience sampling method was adopted to select 454 rural elderly aged 65 years and above in a township of Luzhou City. The dietary survey was conducted using a semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire(FFQ-25), and the questionnaire information was collected by face-to-face interviews. Dietary quality was evaluated using the Dietary Balance Index-16(DBI-16) score. RESULTS: The proportion of older people in the region with moderate and high dietary imbalances was 79.7%. Inadequate and excessive dietary intake coexisted. The average daily intake of cereals and potatoes and livestock and meat foods were 356.7 g and 76.2 g, exceeding the recommended intake. The average daily intake of fruit, milk and fish and shrimp intake was 22.8 g, 36 g and 3.7 g, respectively, which was only 10% of the recommended amount, and the intake was seriously insufficient. In addition, the degree of food diversity is relatively low, with most of the average daily intake of food types ranging from five to eight, and only 4.6% of the elderly having more than eight. A total of seven dietary patterns were found among the rural elderly in the region, including a certain degree of under-consumption pattern, a severe under-consumption pattern, a certain degree of over-consumption pattern, and a pattern of both under-consumption and over-consumption. That was dominated by the pattern of severe underconsumption and the pattern of some degree of underconsumption and higher degree of overconsumption, which accounted for 72.3% of the total. CONCLUSION: The rural elderly aged 65 years and above in Luzhou City have a serious dietary imbalance, with a high proportion of insufficient intake of vegetables, fruits and milk, as well as aquatic products and eggs; and excessive intake of livestock, poultry, meat and cereals and potatoes.

Effectiveness of a school-based nutrition and food safety education program among primary and junior high school students in Chongqing, China.

BACKGROUND: Health behavioral patterns, especially eating patterns, established in childhood often carry over into adulthood, and some of the unhealthy ones are later associated with adult morbidity and mortality. Recently, a few nutrition and food safety education programs have been implemented in primary and junior high schools in China. PURPOSE: This study aims to examine the effectiveness of a school-based nutrition and food safety education program among primary and junior high school students in China. METHODS: A mixed study design incorporating an intervention study and a quantitative survey was conducted for this research. With stratified cluster sampling, students from the 5(th) and 6(th) grade in one primary school and the 7(th) and 8(th) grade in one junior high school in Chongqing, China, were all selected and separated randomly into an intervention group (n = 501) and a control group (n = 522). Effectiveness evaluation investigations were performed at the initial time and nine-month follow-up (n = 472), respectively. Effectiveness of pre-/post-intervention and nine-month follow-up changes in scores of nutrition knowledge and food safety was assessed using a two-tailed t-test and analysis of variance. RESULTS: Nutrition knowledge scores for the intervention group were mean 9.03, SD±2.75 at the baseline, and 14.70±3.28 after intervention. There was a significant improvement (t = 29.78, p < 0.01). The nine-month follow-up knowledge scores of the intervention group were 12.35±2.89, which were lower than the immediately after the intervention group (t = 12.40, p<0.01), but higher than those of the baseline level (t = 18.04, p < 0.01). Food safety scores of the post-intervention were higher (p < 0.01) than that of the control group in both pre-intervention and nine-month follow-up. The control group had no significant change in the pre-post intervention. CONCLUSIONS: It is feasible and effective to improve nutrition and food safety knowledge among primary and junior high school students through school-based nutrition and food safety education programs.