“Health-Related Outcomes of New Grocery Store Interventions: a Systematic Review”, 2017-06-01 ():
Objective: To assess the evidence of the impact of new food store (supermarket/grocery store) interventions on selected health-related outcomes.
Design: A systematic review following the Effective Public Health Practice Project guidelines. All quantitative studies were assessed for their methodological quality. Results were synthesized narratively.
Setting: 8 electronic databases—MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, ProQuest Public Health, Web of Science, Scopus, PsycINFO and Cochrane Library—were searched to identify relevant records.
Subjects: Peer-reviewed scholarly journal articles on new grocery store/supermarket interventions with adult study populations, published in the English language after 1995.
Results: 11 records representing 7 new grocery store interventions were identified. 6 were assessed having ‘weak’ methodological quality, one as ‘moderate’ and two as ‘strong’. All studies reported fruit and vegetable consumption but results were not consistent, some studies reporting statistically-significantly more and others no increase in consumption. BMI and self-rated health did not show significant improvements. Perceptions of food access, neighbourhood satisfaction and psychological health showed significant improvements.
Conclusions: Improved food access through establishment of a full-service food retailer, by itself, does not show strong evidence towards enhancing health-related outcomes over short durations. Presently the field is developing and the complex linking pathways/mechanisms are yet to be elucidated. Further evidence, in the form of high-quality research in different communities with longer follow-up periods, is needed to inform policy decisions.