Lessons learned from digital dietary interventions targeting the preconception population.

Area of Science:

• Public Health Nutrition
• Digital Health Interventions
• Preconception Care

Background:

• The preconception phase is critical for maternal and offspring health, emphasizing the need for healthy dietary habits.
• Digital interventions are increasingly explored to support dietary changes during this vital period.
• Existing digital approaches face significant hurdles in implementation and effectiveness.

Purpose of the Study:

• To review digital interventions targeting preconception diet.
• To discuss challenges in engaging the preconception population with digital tools.
• To highlight design and evaluation issues in digital health interventions for this demographic.

Main Methods:

• Systematic review of six digital interventions focused on preconception dietary outcomes.
• Analysis of intervention designs, target populations, and reported effectiveness.
• Examination of recruitment, attrition, and participant engagement data.

Main Results:

• Only two of the reviewed interventions demonstrated effectiveness in improving diet.
• Effective interventions targeted specific, narrow populations or single dietary components.
• Significant challenges were noted in participant recruitment, high attrition rates, and engagement with digital platforms.

Conclusions:

• Current digital interventions for preconception diet have limited success, often due to engagement and recruitment issues.
• There is a need for novel approaches in recruitment, intervention development, and evaluation.
• Future research should consider citizen science, participatory action research, and addressing upstream/structural determinants of diet beyond individual behavior.