A Systematic Review: The Impact of COVID-19 Policy Flexibilities on SNAP and WIC Programmatic Outcomes.

Background: In response to the COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE), the federal government deployed policy flexibilities in food and nutrition assistance programs including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) to meet the needs those experiencing economic hardship. Emergent literature evaluates the impact of these flexibilities on program outcomes.

Objective: To explore the impact of policy flexibilities deployed during the COVID-19 PHE on access, enrollment/retention, benefit utilization, and perceptions of SNAP and WIC.

What do you want to eat? Cuisine and nutrition intervention preferences among people using a large food pantry in Texas.

Objective: Nutrition interventions delivered through food pantries could reduce health disparities for people experiencing food insecurity. We identified clients' preferences for cuisines, nutrition interventions, and outcomes and whether preferences differ for subpopulations.

Methods: Cross-sectional study at a large pantry in Dallas, Texas (N = 200).

Optimal Defaults in Online Grocery Shopping: A Secondary Analysis to Explore Impacts in Multiresident Households and Families.

Objective: To examine whether household type (eg, families with children) moderated the effects of an optimal defaults grocery intervention and examine intervention effects on grocery purchases to be consumed by the participant vs others in the household.

Methods: Participants (n = 65) diagnosed with or at risk for type 2 diabetes were recruited and randomized into an optimal default online grocery intervention or an online or in-person control group. Grocery receipt data were coded into Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension nutritional quality scores, and energy, carbohydrate, and sugar content were calculated.

HIV Support Source: Development of a Distress Screening Measure for Adults with HIV.

To provide an effective, multidimensional, and psychometrically valid measure to screen for distress among people with HIV, we developed and assessed the psychometric properties of HIV Support Source, a distress screening, referral, and support program designed to identify the unmet needs of adults with HIV and link them to desired resources and support. Development and testing were completed in three phases: (1) item generation and initial item pool testing (N = 375), (2) scale refinement via exploratory factor analysis (N = 220); external/internal item quality, and judging theoretical and practical implications of items, and (3) confirmatory validation (N = 150) including confirmatory factor analysis along with reliability and validity analyses to corroborate dimensionality and psychometric properties of the final measure. Nonparametric receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analyses determined scoring thresholds for depression and anxiety risk subscales.

A pilot randomized controlled trial comparing nutritious meal kits and no-prep meals to improve food security and diet quality among food pantry clients.

Background: Food pantry clients have high rates of food insecurity and greater risk for and prevalence of diet-related diseases. Many clients face time, resource, and physical constraints that limit their ability to prepare healthy meals using foods typically provided by pantries. We compared two novel approaches to alleviate those barriers and encourage healthier eating: meal kits, which bundle ingredients with a recipe on how to prepare a healthy meal, and nutritious no-prep meals, which can be eaten after thawing or microwaving.

A pilot randomized controlled trial comparing nutritious meal kits and no-prep meals to improve food security and diet quality among food pantry clients.

Background: Food pantry clients have high rates of food insecurity and greater risk for and prevalence of diet-related diseases. Many clients face time, resource, and physical constraints that limit their ability to prepare healthy meals using foods typically provided by pantries. We compared two novel approaches to alleviate those barriers and encourage healthier eating: meal kits, which bundle ingredients with a recipe on how to prepare a healthy meal, and nutritious no-prep meals, which can be eaten after thawing or microwaving.

Salivary Epigenetic Measures of Body Mass Index and Social Determinants of Health Across Childhood and Adolescence.

Importance: Children who are socioeconomically disadvantaged are at increased risk for high body mass index (BMI) and multiple diseases in adulthood. The developmental origins of health and disease hypothesis proposes that early life conditions affect later-life health in a manner that is only partially modifiable by later-life experiences.

Objective: To examine whether epigenetic measures of BMI developed in adults are valid biomarkers of childhood BMI and if they are sensitive to early life social determinants of health.

Feasibility and implementation of a grocery shopping intervention for adults diagnosed with or at-risk for type 2 diabetes.

Objective: To examine the feasibility and implementation of an optimal defaults intervention designed to align grocery purchases with a diet recommended for people with or at-risk for type 2 diabetes.

Design: This was a 5-week pilot randomised trial with three groups: in-person grocery shopping, shopping online and shopping online with 'default' carts. Participants were asked to shop normally in Week One, according to group assignment in Weeks Two-Four (intervention period), and as preferred in Week Five.

Measuring the long arm of childhood in real-time: Epigenetic predictors of BMI and social determinants of health across childhood and adolescence.

Children who are socioeconomically disadvantaged are at increased risk for high body mass index (BMI) and multiple diseases in adulthood. The developmental origins of health and disease hypothesis proposes that early life conditions affect later-life health in a manner that is only partially modifiable by later-life experiences. Epigenetic mechanisms may regulate the influence of early life conditions on later life health.

Effects of a grocery shopping intervention designed to improve diet adherence in diabetes: a randomized trial.

Objective: The goal of this study was to examine the potential of an optimal-defaults intervention to promote grocery purchases corresponding to a diet for diabetes.

Methods: In total, 65 adults diagnosed with or at increased risk for type 2 diabetes who grocery shopped at one of two study stores were randomized to one of three groups: Defaults, Online, or Control. All groups received diabetes-friendly recipes.

Objective and perceived barriers and facilitators of daily fruit and vegetable consumption among under-resourced communities in Central Texas.

Introduction: Fruit and vegetable consumption (FVC) continues to be low, particularly among people living in under-resourced communities. Identifying barriers and facilitators of FVC and whether those barriers and facilitators differ for racially and ethnically minoritized people is imperative for developing effective and equitable public health policies and interventions.

Methods: A baseline cohort of 390 participants from Central Texas communities historically lacking healthy food retailers completed a survey including FVC, 7 psychosocial barriers and facilitators of FVC, distance to a grocery retailer, participation in government assistance programs, and race/ethnicity.

Family Food Insecurity, Food Acquisition, and Eating Behavior Over 6 Months Into the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Objectives: Describe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-related employment and food acquisition changes for food-secure and food-insecure households. Examine associations between food insecurity, parent food acquisition, and child eating.

Methods: A nationally representative cross-sectional survey with parents (N = 1,000) in Fall 2020.

Written or drawn episodic future thinking cues improves delay discounting in adults.

Delay discounting (DD) describes choices between small, immediate rewards and larger, delayed rewards. Individuals who are high in DD favor small, immediate rewards, and this preference is related to health behaviors including higher energy intake, smoking and less physical activity. Episodic future thinking (EFT) is an intervention in which one thinks about personal positive future events and this decreases DD in adults and children.

Mothers' DASH diet adherence and food purchases after week-long episodic future thinking intervention.

Prospection has helped participants forego the temptation to buy and eat higher calorie nutrient poor foods in favor of buying and eating fewer calories and healthier macronutrient profiles in laboratory tasks and brief field studies. This pilot study examines whether episodic future thinking (EFT) improves mothers' dietary behavior and food purchasing over a longer 7-10-day period. The study utilized a 2 × 2 factorial design with mothers (N = 60) randomized to EFT or standardized episodic thinking (SET) crossed with dietary approaches to stop hypertension (DASH) diet education or a food safety education control.

An ecological momentary episodic future thinking intervention on mother's weekly food purchases.

Background: Imagining one's own future (episodic future thinking, EFT) has helped mothers with overweight purchase healthier groceries during an online shopping task in the laboratory. The present study explored whether delivering an EFT intervention to participants' devices via an ecological momentary intervention (EMI) tool would help mothers purchase healthier food at brick-and-mortar stores.

Method: Participants (N = 43, mothers 31-52 years of age, BMI ≥ 24.

The introduction of new food retail opportunities in lower-income communities and the impact on fruit and vegetable intake: a systematic review.

A lack of access to fresh fruits and vegetables (F&Vs) is associated with consumption of fewer F&Vs and higher risk of obesity, especially for lower-income individuals. It is widely believed that the addition of new food retail opportunities could improve F&V consumption and subsequently reduce the chronic disease burden. Observational studies provide some support for these hypotheses, but contradictions exist.

Improvements in episodic future thinking methodology: Establishing a standardized episodic thinking control.

Objective: Delay discounting (DD) is the choice of a smaller immediate reward over a larger delayed reward, which has been associated with a number of maladaptive behaviors. Episodic future thinking (EFT), the ability to project oneself into the future, is an intervention designed to reduce DD. EFT has reliable effects on DD, but the size of the effect varies, which could be due in part to the use of different control groups.

Mix and Match: An Investigation into Whether Episodic Future Thinking Cues Need to Match Discounting Delays in Order to Be Effective.

Episodic future thinking (EFT), or prospectively imagining yourself in the future, has been developed into an intervention tool to reduce delay discounting (DD), or the preference for smaller immediate over larger future rewards, and to make healthier choices that promote long-term health rather than short-term enjoyment. Most EFT interventions use EFT cues whose future events match the time delays of the DD task, which may limit the utility of EFT. The current study ( = 160, = 35.

Episodic future thinking and grocery shopping online.

Grocery shopping shapes the home food environment, which can contribute to the development of obesity. Episodic future thinking (EFT) helps adults make healthier decisions by initiating prospective thinking, which guides one to forego smaller immediate rewards in favor of larger delayed rewards. EFT could help parents improve grocery purchases thereby improving the home food environment and family eating behaviors.

Epidemiological Trends in Colorectal Cancer in China: An Ecological Study.

Background: Due to the changes in lifestyle and dietary behaviors, the incidence of colorectal cancer (CRC) has been rapidly increasing in China.

Aims: This study is to present the trends of CRC in China over the past decade.

Methods: It used a series of nationally representative data, including the National Central Cancer Registry of China, the GLOBOCAN project and the Global Burden of Disease.

Clinical guidelines of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease: A systematic review.

Aim: To perform a systematic review to grade guidelines and present recommendations for clinical management of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD).

Methods: A database search was conducted on PubMed for guidelines published before May 2016, supplemented by reviewing relevant websites. The Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation (ARGEE) Instrument II was a tool designed to appraise the methodological rigor and transparency in which a clinical guideline is developed and it is used internationally.