A Community-Based School Nutrition Intervention Improves Diet Diversity and School Attendance in Palestinian Refugee Schoolchildren in Lebanon

Zeina Jamaluddine; Jowel Choufani; Amelia Reese Masterson; Reem Hoteit; Nadine R Sahyoun; Hala Ghattas

doi:10.1093/cdn/nzaa164

A Community-Based School Nutrition Intervention Improves Diet Diversity and School Attendance in Palestinian Refugee Schoolchildren in Lebanon

Curr Dev Nutr. 2020 Nov 24;4(11):nzaa164. doi: 10.1093/cdn/nzaa164. eCollection 2020 Nov.

Authors

Zeina Jamaluddine¹, Jowel Choufani², Amelia Reese Masterson³, Reem Hoteit⁴, Nadine R Sahyoun⁵, Hala Ghattas¹

Affiliations

¹ Center for Research on Population and Health, American University of Beirut, Beirut, Lebanon.
² The George Washington University, Washington, DC, USA.
³ CitySeed, Inc., New Haven, CT, USA.
⁴ Department of Family Medicine, American University of Beirut Medical Center, Beirut, Lebanon.
⁵ Department of Nutrition and Food Science, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA.

Abstract

Background: School feeding programs have the potential to supply children with healthy school food, alleviate short-term hunger, and improve children's educational outcomes.

Objectives: We linked community kitchens to a subsidized school snack intervention and assessed the impact of this intervention on nutritional (diet diversity, hemoglobin, and anthropometry) and educational (attendance and academic performance) outcomes of Palestinian refugee schoolchildren.

Methods: We collected data from 1362 students (aged 5-15 y) and their parents at baseline, and at an 8-mo follow-up in 2 control and 2 intervention schools. We conducted linear, logistic, and negative binomial regression analyses to assess changes in outcomes of children participating in the intervention schools compared with children in control schools (intention-to-treat). We also assessed the impact of the snack intervention in children who participated ≥50% of the time (HP, high-participation) compared with those who participated <50% (LP, low-participation), or who only received nutrition education (control) (per protocol). All the analyses were adjusted for child age and gender, maternal education, household expenditure, and school-level clustering effect.

Results: At endline, there were 648 children in the control group, and within the intervention group, 260 children were LP and 454 were HP. There was a significantly greater increase in overall diet diversity score and dairy consumption in the HP group compared with controls. Both LP and HP groups were more likely to consume proteins, and less likely to consume desserts than controls. Furthermore, the HP group had a significant increase in hemoglobin, and both LP and HP groups had a significant decrease in school absenteeism compared with controls.

Conclusions: This community-based school nutrition intervention had a positive impact on diet diversity, hemoglobin, and school attendance of children.

Keywords: diet diversity; double burden of malnutrition; food security; nutrition intervention; school feeding program.