Cargando…

KIMEHS—Proposal of an Index for Qualitative Evaluation of Children’s Menus—A Pilot Study

Considering the importance of the food environments for health promotion, and the lack of simple, easy to use, low-cost measures of the quality of meals, the authors developed a qualitative menu index (KIMEHS—Kids’ Menu Healthy Score), tailored to children’s menu evaluation. Development of the tool...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Rocha, Ada, Viegas, Claudia
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7694791/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33172175
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/foods9111618
_version_ 1783615056042262528
author Rocha, Ada
Viegas, Claudia
author_facet Rocha, Ada
Viegas, Claudia
author_sort Rocha, Ada
collection PubMed
description Considering the importance of the food environments for health promotion, and the lack of simple, easy to use, low-cost measures of the quality of meals, the authors developed a qualitative menu index (KIMEHS—Kids’ Menu Healthy Score), tailored to children’s menu evaluation. Development of the tool was based on the Mediterranean food pattern. It includes 18 components, divided into seven main groups that reflect key aspects of menu quality, including protein source, side dishes, vegetables, dessert and beverages, and also allergens and nutritional information. The index was analysed for content and construct validity, as well as inter-rater reliability, and was applied to a sample of menus from restaurants in shopping centres in the Lisbon region. Possible index point ranges from −17 to 17, with a higher score indicating greater compliance with the recommendations. A value of 5.5 is obtained if all KIMEHS items are available, considering healthy and non-healthy options. The inter-rater reliability was assessed and values above 0.80 were obtained for Alpha Cronbach, as well as agreement % rate >75%. Agreement percentage is above 75% for all the components. Evaluated restaurants scored from −14 to 7, with an average KIMEHS of −6.15. Only four restaurants scored positive values, ranging from 0.25 to 7. KIMEHS was considered to be an adequate index to evaluate children’s menus, from the menu information displayed on restaurant websites and/or on restaurant displays or table menus. It is a simple, low-cost tool that may be used as a reference for health professionals as an objective measure to evaluate the food environment. Stakeholders could also be involved in their own assessment to help educate consumers about healthy food choices, strengthening the efforts to promote an adequate food pattern and health, contributing to the fight against obesity.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-7694791
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2020
publisher MDPI
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-76947912020-11-28 KIMEHS—Proposal of an Index for Qualitative Evaluation of Children’s Menus—A Pilot Study Rocha, Ada Viegas, Claudia Foods Article Considering the importance of the food environments for health promotion, and the lack of simple, easy to use, low-cost measures of the quality of meals, the authors developed a qualitative menu index (KIMEHS—Kids’ Menu Healthy Score), tailored to children’s menu evaluation. Development of the tool was based on the Mediterranean food pattern. It includes 18 components, divided into seven main groups that reflect key aspects of menu quality, including protein source, side dishes, vegetables, dessert and beverages, and also allergens and nutritional information. The index was analysed for content and construct validity, as well as inter-rater reliability, and was applied to a sample of menus from restaurants in shopping centres in the Lisbon region. Possible index point ranges from −17 to 17, with a higher score indicating greater compliance with the recommendations. A value of 5.5 is obtained if all KIMEHS items are available, considering healthy and non-healthy options. The inter-rater reliability was assessed and values above 0.80 were obtained for Alpha Cronbach, as well as agreement % rate >75%. Agreement percentage is above 75% for all the components. Evaluated restaurants scored from −14 to 7, with an average KIMEHS of −6.15. Only four restaurants scored positive values, ranging from 0.25 to 7. KIMEHS was considered to be an adequate index to evaluate children’s menus, from the menu information displayed on restaurant websites and/or on restaurant displays or table menus. It is a simple, low-cost tool that may be used as a reference for health professionals as an objective measure to evaluate the food environment. Stakeholders could also be involved in their own assessment to help educate consumers about healthy food choices, strengthening the efforts to promote an adequate food pattern and health, contributing to the fight against obesity. MDPI 2020-11-06 /pmc/articles/PMC7694791/ /pubmed/33172175 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/foods9111618 Text en © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Rocha, Ada
Viegas, Claudia
KIMEHS—Proposal of an Index for Qualitative Evaluation of Children’s Menus—A Pilot Study
title KIMEHS—Proposal of an Index for Qualitative Evaluation of Children’s Menus—A Pilot Study
title_full KIMEHS—Proposal of an Index for Qualitative Evaluation of Children’s Menus—A Pilot Study
title_fullStr KIMEHS—Proposal of an Index for Qualitative Evaluation of Children’s Menus—A Pilot Study
title_full_unstemmed KIMEHS—Proposal of an Index for Qualitative Evaluation of Children’s Menus—A Pilot Study
title_short KIMEHS—Proposal of an Index for Qualitative Evaluation of Children’s Menus—A Pilot Study
title_sort kimehs—proposal of an index for qualitative evaluation of children’s menus—a pilot study
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7694791/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33172175
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/foods9111618
work_keys_str_mv AT rochaada kimehsproposalofanindexforqualitativeevaluationofchildrensmenusapilotstudy
AT viegasclaudia kimehsproposalofanindexforqualitativeevaluationofchildrensmenusapilotstudy