ASPO Abstracts
Assessing a Culinary Medicine Program to Increase Healthy Eating among Cancer Survivors and Their Caregivers
Category: Lifestyles Behavior, Energy Balance & Chemoprevention
Conference Year: 2020
Abstract Body:
Purpose
This pilot project aimed to evaluate the efficacy of a 6-week culinary medicine program among adult cancer
survivors, their caregivers, and primary care patients in Alabama by assessing participants’ nutrition
knowledge, beliefs and self-reported dietary habits.
Methods
Participants completed a culinary medicine program (Health Meets Foodâ„¢ curriculum) consisting of six, 2-hour
weekly sessions combining a 30-minute didactic nutrition lesson with 1.5-hours of hands-on cooking. Didactic
sessions covered primary components and benefits of the Mediterranean and Dietary Approaches to Stop
Hypertension (DASH) diets, nutrition labels, and portion sizes. Participants (N=16) completed a 50-question
survey assessing dietary knowledge, self-reported weekly diet, and cooking behaviors at baseline and 6-weeks
post-program.
Results
The majority of participants were between 55-74 years of age (93.8%), female (87.5%), non-Hispanic White
(68.8%) and overweight or obese (62.5%). Overall program attendance was 82.0%. Positive changes were
observed between pre- and post-program for: cooking/helping cook a meal ≥5 times per week (50.0% vs.
68.8%); preparing meals at home including breakfast (53.3% vs. 75.0%), lunch (50.0% vs. 75.0%), and dinner
(37.5% vs. 73.3%); and using nutrition labels to make food choices (43.8% vs. 62.5%). Also, 18.8% of
participants reported never eating sweet snack foods in the previous week at baseline compared to 37.5%
post-program. At baseline, no participants reported having knowledge of the Mediterranean or DASH diets and
associated health effects compared with 75.0% and 56.3% who reported being knowledgeable or very
knowledgeable of these, respectively, post-program. Individuals’ dietary habits improved post-program, with
those reporting poor or fair overall eating habits decreasing from 31.3% to 6.7%.
Conclusions
Findings from this pilot project demonstrate the potential effectiveness of a culinary medicine program as an
educational and behavioral intervention to increase healthy eating behaviors in cancer survivors, their
caregivers, and primary care patients. Further research is needed to determine the sustainability of these
behavioral modifications, generalizability of the program, and potential improvements of metabolic indices.
Keywords: culinary medicine; cancer survivors