Ariene Silva do Carmo¹, Taciana Maia de Sousa^1,, Cristianny Miranda e Silva¹, Angélica Ribeiro e Silva¹, Adriana Cândida da Silva¹, Arabele Teixeira de Lacerda¹, Luana Rosa de Oliveira², Adilana Oliveira Rocha Alcântara², Simone Cardoso Lisboa Pereira¹, Luana Caroline dos Santos¹

This study aimed to evaluate the effect of a nutritional intervention on eating habits and nutritional status of schoolchildren. It is a non-controlled intervention study with children from the 4th grade of elementary of nine public schools of a Brazilian metropolis. Five workshops based on healthy eating habits were performed using ludic activities. Eating habits (food frequency questionnaire) and anthropometry (weight and height) were evaluated before and after the intervention. Nutritional status was obtained by Body Mass Index (BMI)-for-age. McNemar test was performed with 5% significance. We evaluated 613 students with a median age of 9.4 (8.6-11.9) years. After the nutritional intervention, we observed a reduction in the consumption of chips, cookies, candy, artificial juice and soft drinks (p<0.05). There was no significant change in the nutritional status (p>0.05). The intervention had a positive effect on eating habits of schoolchildren which might contribute to future changes on nutritional status.

nutritional intervention, schoolchildren, food consumption, nutritional status, child health