Murdoch Children's Research Institute, Policy and Equity Research Group, Parkville, Vic., Australia.
College of Health and Biomedicine, Victoria University, St Albans, Vic., Australia.
Health Promot J Austr. 2019 Dec;30 Suppl 1:43-51. doi: 10.1002/hpja.229. Epub 2019 Feb 4.
Health and nutrition inequalities are prevalent among families from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds. However, there is limited evidence of targeted early childhood nutrition and active play approaches due to the methodological challenges in engaging vulnerable families in research.
The aim of this paper was to report findings from a pilot intervention called Confident and Understanding Parents (CUPs). CUPs aims to improve child nutrition and active play-related outcomes for children in vulnerable families. The intervention was delivered in six Supported Playgroups (SPs) in two disadvantaged locations in Victoria. Surveys incorporated knowledge and confidence measures and were administered pre- and post-training of SP facilitators along with pre-, immediately post and and 3 months postintervention to SP facilitators and parents. Qualitative data were collected via debriefing discussions with SP facilitators and ethnographic observations during SP sessions. Thematic analyses of qualitative data and statistical quantitative analyses were conducted.
Nine SP facilitators completed training, of whom six delivered CUPs in SPs with 64 parents of children aged 0 to 4 years from socially disadvantaged backgrounds. Forty-three parents (66%) attended a minimum of 50% of SP sessions with CUPs delivery. SP facilitators and parents demonstrated improved knowledge and confidence following the pilot. Learnings for implementation were identified.
Overall, the CUPs intervention reached and engaged vulnerable families. A strength of the intervention is the flexibility offered to SP facilitators in selecting key messages and the strong focus on "local" translation of key child nutrition and active play messages within existing early childhood settings. A further strength was the adaptation of evaluation methodology to optimise the engagement of vulnerable families. SO WHAT?: This pilot study provides insights about engaging vulnerable families in a nutrition and active play intervention to promote child health. These promising findings warrant further implementation and rigorous evaluation of CUPs.
健康和营养不平等在社会经济处于不利地位的家庭中普遍存在。然而，由于在研究中让弱势家庭参与存在方法学上的挑战，因此针对幼儿营养和积极游戏的具体方法的证据有限。
本文的目的是报告一项名为“自信和理解父母”（CUPs）的试点干预措施的结果。CUPs 旨在改善弱势家庭儿童的营养和积极游戏相关结果。该干预措施在维多利亚州两个弱势地区的六个支持性游戏小组（SP）中进行。调查纳入了知识和信心衡量标准，并在 SP 协调员培训前后以及 SP 协调员和家长在干预前后立即和 3 个月进行了管理。通过与 SP 协调员进行的汇报讨论和 SP 会议期间的民族志观察收集了定性数据。对定性数据进行了主题分析，并进行了统计定量分析。
9 名 SP 协调员完成了培训，其中 6 名协调员在 SP 中为 64 名来自社会劣势背景的 0 至 4 岁儿童的父母提供了 CUPs。43 名家长（66％）参加了至少 50％的 SP 会议，会上提供了 CUPs 服务。SP 协调员和家长在试点后表现出了更好的知识和信心。确定了实施方面的经验教训。
总体而言，CUPs 干预措施覆盖并吸引了弱势家庭。该干预措施的一个优势是为 SP 协调员提供了选择关键信息的灵活性，并且非常注重在现有幼儿环境中“本地化”翻译关键儿童营养和积极游戏信息。另一个优势是调整了评估方法，以优化弱势家庭的参与度。
所以呢？：这项试点研究提供了有关参与营养和积极游戏干预措施以促进儿童健康的弱势家庭的见解。这些有希望的发现值得进一步实施和严格评估 CUPs。
