Cooking schools improve food intake patterns and diabetes knowledge of people with diabetes

Abstract

Implementation of nutrition recommendations is often difficult for people with diabetes. The objective was to determine if cooking schools delivered by the Cooperative Extension Service in collaboration with registered dietitians and certified diabetes educators improved dietary patterns and knowledge of people with diabetes. The research design was quasi‐experimental with a pretest, posttest design. Each subject served as his or her own control. Kitchen Creations cooking schools intervention consisted of four, three‐hour long lessons. The cooking schools featured current nutrition recommendations for people with diabetes and hands‐on food preparation and cooking experiences. Participants completed three‐day food records and demographics and knowledge questionnaires prior to attending Kitchen Creations and one month after completing the Kitchen Creations series. Following participation in Kitchen Creations, participants showed significant (p<0.05) decreases in energy, fat energy, fat grams, percent of calories from fat, fat exchanges, saturated fat energy, saturated fat grams, carbohydrate grams, cholesterol (mg) and sodium (mg). Bread exchanges and "other carbohydrate" exchanges decreased (p<0.05.) Vegetable exhanges increased in women (p<0.05) but not in men. Knowledge of nutrition recommendations for people with diabetes significantly (p<0.05) improved. Results indicate that a cooking school approach can successfully change food intake patterns. Funding provided by the USDA Cooperative State Research, Education & Extension Service, New Mexico State University and the New Mexico Department of Health, Diabetes Prevention and Control Program.