SynthesisObesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity2017
The impact of interventions to promote healthier ready-to-eat meals (to eat in, to take away or to be delivered) sold by specific food outlets open to the general public: a systematic review.
Synthesis in Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 49 papers, 9 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
49 citing papers in PubMed, 9 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Healthy eating interventions conducted in small, local restaurants and hot food takeaways: a systematic review.Public health nutrition · 2025Pooled it
- The implementation and effectiveness of outlet-level healthy food and beverage accreditation schemes: A systematic review.Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity · 2023Pooled it
- Factors Influencing Implementation, Sustainability and Scalability of Healthy Food Retail Interventions: A Systematic Review of Reviews.Nutrients · 2022Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Interventions to Promote Healthy Meals in Full-Service Restaurants and Canteens: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Nutrients · 2021Pooled it
- An Umbrella Review and Narrative Synthesis of the Effectiveness of Interventions Aimed at Decreasing Food Prices to Increase Food Quality.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2019Pooled it
- Americans' Perceptions about Fast Food and How They Associate with Its Consumption and Obesity Risk.Advances in nutrition (Bethesda, Md.) · 2018Pooled it
- The effects of public health policies on health inequalities in high-income countries: an umbrella review.BMC public health · 2018Pooled it
- The impact of interventions to promote healthier ready-to-eat meals (to eat in, to take away or to be delivered) sold by specific food outlets open to the general public: a systematic review.Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity · 2017Pooled it
- A Cluster Randomized Trial to Promote Healthy Menu Items for Children: The Kids' Choice Restaurant Program.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2017Trial
- 'We all need to be on the same page': sustainment of healthy food retail practices in Australian public settings.Health promotion international · 2026Article
- Digital marketing techniques within online food retail platforms: a scoping review.BMC medicine · 2025Article
- Article
- Ready-to-eat food intake associates with PHQ-9-based depression in US adults: a cross-sectional study.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Neighbourhood out-of-home food environment, menu healthiness, and their associations with meal purchasing and diet quality: a multiverse analysis.Nutrition journal · 2025Article
- Health economics evidence for food system policy: a systematic review of reviews.Frontiers in nutrition · 2025Review
- Unpacking food environment policy landscapes for healthier diets in "emerging" countries: the case of Viet Nam.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Association between Number of Teeth and Eating out of Home: A 2019 Statistical Survey of the Japanese Representative Population.Nutrients · 2024Article
- Retailer Responses to Public Consultations on the Adoption of Takeaway Management Zones Around Schools: A Longitudinal Qualitative Analysis.International journal of health policy and management · 2024Article
- High street retail environment interventions and their theorised impacts on health and wellbeing: A scoping review.PloS one · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
11 authors.
Funding
Abstract
introductionReady-to-eat meals sold by food outlets that are accessible to the general public are an important target for public health intervention. We conducted a systematic review to assess the impact of such interventions.
methodsStudies of any design and duration that included any consumer-level or food-outlet-level before-and-after data were included.
resultsThirty studies describing 34 interventions were categorized by type and coded against the Nuffield intervention ladder: restrict choice = trans fat law (n = 1), changing pre-packed children's meal content (n = 1) and food outlet award schemes (n = 2); guide choice = price increases for unhealthier choices (n = 1), incentive (contingent reward) (n = 1) and price decreases for healthier choices (n = 2); enable choice = signposting (highlighting healthier/unhealthier options) (n = 10) and telemarketing (offering support for the provision of healthier options to businesses via telephone) (n = 2); and provide information = calorie labelling law (n = 12), voluntary nutrient labelling (n = 1) and personalized receipts (n = 1). Most interventions were aimed at adults in US fast food chains and assessed customer-level outcomes. More 'intrusive' interventions that restricted or guided choice generally showed a positive impact on food-outlet-level and customer-level outcomes. However, interventions that simply provided information or enabled choice had a negligible impact.
conclusionInterventions to promote healthier ready-to-eat meals sold by food outlets should restrict choice or guide choice through incentives/disincentives. Public health policies and practice that simply involve providing information are unlikely to be effective.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.