Identifying mechanisms that shape the food environment in long-term healthcare facilities in the Netherlands: a participatory system dynamics approach.

Background: Creating healthy and sustainable food environments within long-term healthcare facilities asks for a systemic approach. This study aimed to: (1) identify system dynamics underlying the food environment of long-term healthcare facilities, (2) formulate actions for changing the system to promote a healthy and sustainable food environment and (3) evaluate stakeholder perspectives about the process and progress towards action implementation up to one-year follow-up.

Methods: A group model building (GMB) approach was used during two workshops with stakeholders of five different long-term healthcare facilities in the Netherlands.

Which factors influence the transition towards a healthy and sustainable food environment in Dutch hospitals? A qualitative view from stakeholders.

Background: Hospitals fulfill an important exemplary role in promoting health and well-being. It is therefore crucial to have a supportive food environment that stimulates healthy and sustainable food choices of patients, staff, and visitors. This qualitative study aimed to identify factors influencing the implementation of long-lasting actions to enhance the healthiness and sustainability of the food environment in the hospital setting in the Netherlands, from the perspective of different stakeholders.

The Healthy Supermarket Coach: effects of a nutrition peer-education intervention in Dutch supermarkets on adolescents' food purchases.

Background: Dutch adolescents predominantly purchase unhealthy snacks in supermarkets, which negatively influence their health. The aim of this study was to investigate the short- and longer-term effects of a nutrition peer-education intervention in supermarkets on food purchases and determinants of food purchase behaviour among adolescents of different education levels.

Methods: We performed a quasi-experimental study in three supermarkets (two intervention and one comparison school) in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Understanding the dynamics driving obesity in socioeconomically deprived urban neighbourhoods: an expert-based systems map.

Background: Over the past decades, the prevalence of obesity among adults has rapidly increased, particularly in socioeconomically deprived urban neighbourhoods. To better understand the complex mechanisms behind this trend, we created a system map exposing the underlying system driving obesity prevalence in socioeconomically deprived urban neighbourhoods over the last three decades in the Netherlands.

Methods: We conducted Group Model Building (GMB) sessions with a group of thirteen interdisciplinary experts to develop a Causal Loop Diagram (CLD) of the obesogenic system.

Temptation at every corner: exploring public perceptions of food cues and policy support for governmental food cue regulation in outdoor public spaces.

Background: Unhealthy visual food cues in outdoor public spaces are external drivers of unhealthy diets. Food cues are visible situations associated with food-related memories. This study aimed to gain insight into the (un)healthy food cues residents notice in outdoor public spaces in Dutch municipalities.