Hygienic Assessment of Contemporary Nutrition of Schoolchildren at Home

Abstract

Background: Properly organized nutrition of school-age children and adolescents is an important prerequisite for their health maintenance. In the context of digitalization of education, given the pronounced physical inactivity, in-home eating develops and forms new eating habits affecting the consumption of breakfasts and lunches at school and at home. Modern schoolchildren do not follow a daily routine or a regimented diet; they often overeat or undereat and refuse unfamiliar foods not eaten at home but served for school meals, thus reducing their daily nutrient intake critical for normal growth. Under modern educational conditions, both school catering and the analysis and timely correction of the dietary pattern of schoolchildren at home, bearing in mind the continuity of home and school nutrition, are important for proper child development. Objective: To assess nutrition of modern schoolchildren at home. Materials and methods: To establish home food preferences, a survey of first to eleventh grade students and their parents was conducted in 2018–2021 based on a self-administered questionnaire specially developed in the light of principles of a healthy diet recommended by the World Health Organization. The form contained questions about the children’s diet, eating schedule, breakfasting, and consumption of fruit, fish, side dishes, soups, and confectionery. Results: The findings showed that the regular diet of students of all grades lacked a whole number of recommended dishes while high school students rarely ate breakfast at home and had fewer vegetable side dishes, soups and porridges in their diet than the younger children. Only 69.5 % of the respondents reported having regular breakfasts at home on school days. The percentage of such respondents was significantly lower among high school students (p < 0.05), which could be attributed to lower parental control and greater independence of adolescents in this age group. The survey showed that 16 % of ele- mentary school children did not have breakfast at home, but this rate decreased significantly to 8.5 % among fifth to eighth graders (p < 0.05). Conclusion: Nutrition of schoolchildren at home shall be corrected and improved. A competent choice of healthy foods requires food literacy interventions as a promising strategy for educating both parents and children. Previously formed and newly acquired eating habits shall be taken into account when developing a diet for children.