Teaching Kitchen Multisite Trial

Summary

This TK-MT is an interactive year-long program that teaches culinary skills, nutrition education, mindfulness, and stress reduction, promotes movement, and optimizes behavior change through health coaching strategies. The purpose of this study is to test whether a referral-based teaching kitchen intervention offered for 12 months in adjunct to primary care obesity management is feasible, acceptable, and effective on improving health behaviors and obesity prevention. Specifically, the primary goal of the study is to provide evidence of improved behavior change (ex: increases in cooking at home, fruit and vegetable intake, exercise, sleep, mindful activities), improved lab values (ex: fasting blood glucose, cholesterol, triglycerides, etc.), and resulting change in body weight and waist circumference measures. The hypothesis is that by participating in this novel TK-MT intervention - learning to cook healthy, delicious, inexpensive meals at home; understanding principles of good nutrition (based on the Harvard Healthy Eating Plate); incorporating exercise more effectively into daily living; reducing stress and increasing mindfulness and sleep; and, having access to principles of health coaching - in order to leverage personal motivations - can provide a platform to transform individuals and consequently their health, not only for the duration of this study (16 weeks intensive, 8 months boosters for a total of 12 months) but for their entire lives.

Conditions

• Obesity

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Teaching Kitchen Collaborative Curriculum

Participants in the intervention arm will first attend 16 weeks of intensive 2-hour classes covering hands-on cooking skills, dietary recommendations (as described within the Harvard Healthy Eating Plate), mindfulness and stress reduction skills, activity and movement techniques, and tools for behavior change. Next, they will attend monthly booster classes for 8 months, with a final assessment for the sustainability of outcomes at 18 months. Sessions will be taught by a combination of a chef educator, dietitian, health coach, or medical doctor. The study will consist of 2 cohorts of individuals from 4 teaching kitchen program institutions. Each institution will run one-two cycles of the program with each cycle including both a treatment and control group. Each individual cohort will consist of a maximum of 80 individuals; with 40 block-randomized to the intervention and 40 in the control group receiving normal standard of care (followed by their PCP).

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Teaching Kitchen Collaborative, Inc.

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• University of California, Los Angeles

  collaborator OTHER

• University of California, Irvine

  collaborator OTHER

• The University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston

  collaborator OTHER

• Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center

  collaborator OTHER

• Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH)

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Kate Janisch, MPH, RDN · HSPH

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

NONE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

25 Years

Max Age

70 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2023-09-01

Primary Completion

2025-10-01

Completion

2026-12-01

Countries

• United States

Study Locations