Building on a Point-of-purchase Intervention to Encourage Healthy Food Choices

Massachusetts General Hospital2,672 enrolled

Overview

This study builds on the framework of a previously implemented color-coded food labeling intervention in a hospital cafeteria by testing the incremental effectiveness of providing employees with individual feedback and incentives for increasing healthy purchases in a 3-arm randomized controlled trial. The investigators hypothesize that employees assigned to receive feedback will increase healthy purchases more than employees who receive no contact and that employees who receive feedback plus incentives will increase healthy purchases more than those who receive feedback alone.

Study Type

INTERVENTIONAL

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

PREVENTION

Masking

NONE

Enrollment

2,672

Conditions

Food Labeling

Interventions

Feedback lettersBEHAVIORAL

Subjects receive feedback letters about the proportion of green, yellow, and red purchases in the cafeteria per month with comparisons to "all employees" and to the "healthiest employees eaters"

Feedback plus incentivesBEHAVIORAL

Subjects receive feedback letters plus small incentives to increase healthy (green-labeled) purchases in the next month

Eligibility

Sex: ALLMin age: 18 YearsHealthy volunteers:

Medical Language ↔ Plain English

Inclusion Criteria: * Employee at Massachusetts General Hospital who uses a cafeteria debit card to pay for cafeteria purchases Exclusion Criteria: * Employees who do not have a cafeteria debit card * Employees with cafeteria debit card but who use it fewer than 3 times a month for the 3 months prior to start of trial

Locations (1)

Massachusetts General Hospital

Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Outcomes

Primary Outcomes

Employee purchases of healthy (green-labeled) items

Time frame: 6 months

Secondary Outcomes

Employee purchases of unhealthy (red-labeled) items

Time frame: 6 months

Data from ClinicalTrials.gov

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