A Trial of Traffic Light Labeling With Behavioral Nudges and a Healthy Recipe Database to Increase Selection of Healthier Foods in Client-choice Food Pantries

NCT ID: NCT04243252

Last Updated: 2021-06-18

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: TERMINATED
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 3 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2020-03-05
• Study Completion Date: 2020-03-12

Brief Summary

This study is a pilot evaluation of the Healthy Pantry Program, a new behavioral economics-based training that allows pantry staff to learn how to implement nudges integrating traffic-light nutrition labeling and a healthy recipe database in the pantry environment. The hypothesis is that participation the Healthy Pantry Program will lead to increases in pantry purchases of healthy foods.

Detailed Description

Food insecurity affects more than one in 10 Americans and is associated with poor nutrition and adverse health outcomes, including diabetes, hypertension, and mental health issues. Many food-insecure individuals use food pantries, which provide charitable food, to supplement household food needs. The emergence of client-choice food pantries, where individuals can select the foods they take home, provides a novel opportunity to intervene on the diets of food pantry clients.

This study evaluates the Healthy Pantry Program (HPP) in a sample of 10 food pantries in the greater Boston area. Pantries will be matched on baseline characteristics and randomized 1:1 into participation in HPP (intervention) or wait list (control). Outcomes data will be collected at the pantry and client level. The aims of the study are as follows:

Aim 1: To evaluate whether HPP is associated with increased healthy food purchases from the food bank by intervention food pantries compared to control food pantries.

Aim 2: To evaluate whether HPP is associated with increases in the availability of healthy food in intervention food pantries compared to control food pantries.

Aim 3: To evaluate whether HPP is associated with an increase in healthy food selection and dietary intake by clients of intervention food pantries compared to clients of control food pantries, using a cross-sectional sample of 400 food pantry clients at baseline and 400 food pantry clients at 6-month follow up.

Conditions

Food Selection

Study Design

• Allocation Method: RANDOMIZED
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Primary Study Purpose: PREVENTION
• Blinding Strategy: NONE

Study Groups

Intervention Food Pantries

Food pantries will complete online training to help them rank foods by nutritional value and promote those foods to pantry clients; the effect on pantries and their clients will be measured.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Healthy Pantry Program

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Food pantries will receive the Healthy Pantry Program online training, which will be completed by at least one pantry staff member and teaches pantry staff a novel traffic-light nutrition labeling system, a multilingual healthy recipe database, and how to use those and other behavioral economic strategies to implement simple interventions in the food pantry to promote client selection of healthier options. Onsite support by a registered dietitian is included.

Control Food Pantries

Food pantries will continue to operate as usual during the study period; the effect on pantries and their clients will be measured.

Group Type: ACTIVE_COMPARATOR

Waitlist Control

Intervention Type: OTHER

Normal food pantry use for duration of the 9-month study period. Control pantries will have access to the Healthy Pantry Program after study is completed.

Interventions

Healthy Pantry Program

Food pantries will receive the Healthy Pantry Program online training, which will be completed by at least one pantry staff member and teaches pantry staff a novel traffic-light nutrition labeling system, a multilingual healthy recipe database, and how to use those and other behavioral economic strategies to implement simple interventions in the food pantry to promote client selection of healthier options. Onsite support by a registered dietitian is included.

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Waitlist Control

Normal food pantry use for duration of the 9-month study period. Control pantries will have access to the Healthy Pantry Program after study is completed.

Intervention Type: OTHER

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• maximum client-choice (clients can choose all items that they take from pantry)
• operate at least once weekly
• affiliated with the Greater Boston Food Bank

• ≥18 years old
• pantry client
• speaks English or Spanish

Exclusion Criteria

• not affiliated with the Greater Boston Food Bank
• operating less than once weekly
• not a maximum client-choice food pantry
• >1 hr drive from Boston
• <50 clients on average per open day

• <18 years old
• does not speak English or Spanish

• Minimum Eligible Age: 18 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Sponsors

Greater Boston Food Bank

UNKNOWN

Sponsor Role: collaborator

Massachusetts General Hospital

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Anne N. Thorndike, MD, MPH

Associate Professor

Responsibility Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Locations

Massachusetts General Hospital

Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Countries

United States

Other Identifiers

2019P003211

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id