Abstract
Objective: To plan nutrition education programs effectively for community-dwelling individuals with physical disabilities, we aimed to determine the neighborhood support associated with their desirable food intake behavior within the sports community.
Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional survey at sports centers in Tokyo, Japan, using an anonymous questionnaire. The final analytic sample consisted of 381 individuals with physical disabilities. Neighborhood support we surveyed were: having supportive family members/neighbors, having supportive and learnable friends, access to healthy food, and access to nutrition information. Food frequency scores were used to evaluate food intake behavior. The association between each neighborhood support and food intake behavior was analyzed using binomial logistic regression analysis by gender, with neighborhood support as the dependent variable and food frequency scores as the independent variables.
Results: The following were factors associated with desirable food intake behavior: for men, supportive family members/neighbors (OR 3.31, 95% CI 1.76-6.23), access to healthy food (OR 2.15, 95% CI 1.19-3.88), access to nutrition information (OR 2.36, 95% CI 1.20-4.65). For women, it was supportive and learnable friends (OR 4.72, 95% CI 2.24-9.97).
Conclusion: Among community-dwelling people with physical disabilities, the expected neighborhood support for their desirable food intake might be different between men and women. For men, family and neighbor support is a key, in addition to access to healthy foods and nutrition information. For women, friend support is more important.
