Keiki (Pediatric) Produce Prescription (KPRx) Program Hawaii

Summary

Children living in food-insecure homes, defined as at some time during the last year their household not having enough food, money, or resources to feed the family experience low intake of fresh fruits and vegetables (FV), and a trajectory for increased risk of obesity and chronic diseases in adulthood. In Hawai'i, a higher proportion of Native Hawaiian (NH) and other Pacific Islander (OPI) children live in food-insecure households when compared with the state average (30% and 50%, respectively vs. 18%) and NHOPI adults suffer disproportionately from chronic disease. Produce prescription programs, provide vouchers to individuals to purchase fresh FV, are promising strategies to improve diet quality and reduce chronic disease risk among food insecure populations. The long-term objective of this research is to reduce nutrition-related health disparities via clinical-community based programming. The Keiki (child) Produce Prescription (KPRx) program was developed and implemented by enlisting University and community researchers and health care providers at the Waianae Coast Comprehensive Health Center (WCCHC). The current study builds on the community-academic partnership to achieve the following specific aim, to measure effectiveness of the KPRx on FV intake, gut microbiome composition, and health related biomarkers in 100 parent-child dyads in the context of household food insecurity from a predominantly NHOPI community in Hawai'i. A community based participatory research approach to carry out a randomized controlled trial that measures the effect of the KPRx on child diet and microbiome, and parent/caregiver diet and health-related biomarkers on 100 parent-child dyads in the context of household food insecurity will be conducted. The community-informed research study will provide data to inform local and state healthcare and nutrition assistance programming policies aimed at reducing food insecurity and health disparities among NHOPI and minority populations.

Conditions

• Malnutrition, Child
• Obesity
• Food Selection
• Nutrition Poor

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Produce Voucher

see arm/group description

BEHAVIORAL

Wait-List Control

see arm/group description

Sponsors & Collaborators

• National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS)

  collaborator NIH

• University of Hawaii

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Marla Berry, PhD · University of Hawaii at Manoa

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

NONE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

2 Years

Max Age

8 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2022-11-01

Primary Completion

2025-01-30

Completion

2025-01-30

Countries

• United States

Study Locations