Michel LucasPh.D.

Dr. Lucas is an Associate Professor with the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine at the School of Medicine of Laval University. He is also a visiting scholar at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He holds a bachelor’s degree in nutrition & dietetics, a master’s degree in public health, a doctorate in epidemiology from Laval University, and a postdoctoral position in nutritional epidemiology from Harvard.

His global health research activities focus on the overall effect of food on the health of populations, including population-based studies of Canadian adults, Aboriginal people in Quebec, Polynesians, cohorts of American nurses, as well as those with children and adolescents. As a designated principal investigator, he leads the vast VisezEau® intervention project involving more than 12 researchers from various universities of Quebec, Ontario and the United States.

The innovative character of Dr. Lucas, along with his constant desire to think outside of the box are reflected in his publications’ success, his outreach and funding. He has received numerous grants, scholarships and awards in recognition of his work. Being a member of several editorial boards and a peer reviewer for prestigious scientific journals, Dr. Lucas has participated in more than 300 publications, given nutrition presentations, and given more than 100 media interviews.

Multidimensional food quality indexes (MFQI)

The 2013 global burden of disease report indicates that inadequate food quality is the leading cause of premature death globally (36.6%), ahead of the combined deaths caused by tobacco (19.9%), alcohol (9%) and sedentary lifestyle (7.1%). However, the definition and tools for determining food quality generate a lot of questions. An overall food analysis using MFQIs would better reflect the complexity of nutrition, and improve our understanding of its role in chronic disease. The MFQIs are practical and tangible tools that would make it possible to determine the overall effect of nutrition, to communicate and act on simple and comprehensible targets for the population, to trace population trends, to compare disparities using socio-demographic characteristics, and to estimate the effects of one of the most important modifiable determinants of health. His work will pave the way for a common use of MFQIs, adapted and easy to manage, both in research and in clinical practice environments.

Intervention

Sugary drinks are aggressively marketed to children. They are the main source of sugar in their diet, and are a modifiable risk factor for overweight. Unlike sugary drinks, non-bottled water is not widely advertised, and is the optimal drink for quenching thirst and hydration. When replacing sweetened beverages, it would prevent overweight. VisezEau® is a multifactorial intervention (school and home) aimed at preventing overweight among Quebec’s elementary school youth. VisezEau® promotes the consumption of non-bottled water and discourages the consumption of sugary drinks in children (5-12 years) of primary schools. VisezEau® will deploy its strategies in 36 elementary schools and the homes of 3,600 students from several school boards. VisezEau® aims to make a substantial contribution to environments that support children’s health and environmental protection by educating on the implications of using non-reusable bottles on water as a collective resource and human right.

Interventions to solve the problem of childhood obesity are crucial. VisezEau® will document this problem and will allow informed decision-making regarding the appropriateness of scaling it up for the province of Quebec.