Use and Assessment of Home-Delivered Meal Service for Children from Low-Income Families

The purposes of this study were to investigate consumption of home-delivered meals among children from low-income families and to assess their perception of the home-delivered meal service. A survey was conducted on 392 children who had received home-delivered meals, and 208 questionnaires (response rate: 53.1%) were analyzed using SPSS (ver 18.0). The respondents consisted of elementary school students (36.1%), middle school students (33.7%), and high school students (30.2%). Approximately half of children received home-delivered meals during their semester and vacation periods, and 52.2% of respondents shared the delivered meals with their brothers or sisters. Eighty-six point one percent of respondents consumed delivered meals within 4 hours after the meals were received at home, and approximately a fifth of respondents left the delivered meal boxes on a sink counter or table until eating. Leftover foods were kept in the refrigerator (52.2%) or on the sink counter/table (2.5%). The quality of the home-delivered meal service was assessed as 3.3 points based on a 5-point scale. ‘Food safety is good’ received the highest score (3.62) and ‘Food taste is good’ received the lowest score (3.07). The results showed that children receiving the home-delivered meal service should be provided information on proper handling and consumption of the delivered meals at home.