Co-Creation of Educational Resources for Culturally Diverse Dietary Advice

Dietary analysis and advice are key components in the prevention of dental caries. Previous research undertaken at Newcastle University highlighted a lack of cultural competence in dietary advice delivery amongst undergraduate dental and hygiene and therapy students.

To co-create, comprehensive educational with students resources to improve dental and hygiene and therapy students' competence in delivering dietary advice to families from a range of cultural backgrounds.

Five dental/hygiene and therapy students from diverse cultural backgrounds were employed as student co-creators. Each co-creator was assigned a cultural area of interest and supported to develop a sustainable educational resource that could aid their peers to deliver dietary advice to families from that background. Following this, an evaluation interview was conducted with each co-creator to gain insight into their experience of the process.

Co-creators held focus groups with fellow students to identify key foods and drinks consumed within their assigned region, and categorised these into groups based on their sugar content, using a traffic light system. The students used varied approaches to present their resource to their peers. Together, the co-creators developed a 'diet dictionary' that students could refer to in a clinical setting if they encountered a food/drink with which they were unfamiliar. Co-creators valued the experience of contributing to teaching in this way and felt they had developed beneficial skills.

Co-creation provided a novel approach to tackle this pedagogical challenge, culminating in the production of sustainable educational resources to improve cultural competence in dietary advice delivery within dental teaching clinics.