Improving nutrition and physical activity environments of family child care homes: the rationale, design and study protocol of the ‘Healthy Start/Comienzos Sanos’ cluster randomized trial

摘要

BackgroundEarly childhood is a crucial time to foster healthy eating and physical activity (PA) habits, which are critical for optimal child health, growth and development. Child care facilities are important settings to promote healthy eating and PA and prevent childhood obesity; however, almost all prior intervention studies have focused on child care centers and not family child care homes (FCCH), which care for over 1.6 million U.S. children.