Process evaluation of the Healthy Youngsters, Healthy Dads Community program: a healthy lifestyle program for fathers and their preschool-aged children delivered by trained facilitators in community settings

The Healthy Youngsters Healthy Dads (HYHD) intervention is the same as that described in the RCT (ACTRN12619000105145). In summary, the program is implemented face-to-face over 8 weeks with two ‘dads-only’ information workshops and eight weekly ‘dads-and-youngsters’ education and practical sessions. The two 'dads-only' workshops occur before week 1 and week 2 of the 'dads-and-youngsters' sessions. During each dads-only workshop, fathers learn evidenced-based strategies to improve their own lifestyle behaviours and parenting practices to improve their children’s physical activity, dietary habits, social-emotional well-being and sports skills. Each dads-and-youngsters practical session is broken up into 2 components: (i) A 20-minute educational session based on weekly theme, conducted for fathers and children together (ii) A 55-minute practical session where fathers and children participate together in rough and tumble play (e.g. sock wrestles), health-related fitness (e.g. fitness circuits, shuttle carries) and fundamental movement skills (e.g. catching, kicking, throwing). Mothers/partners and siblings will also be invited to attend session 5 of the program, where all family members participate in all activities together. In addition to these sessions, participants will receive the following program resources: - A t-shirt, water bottle and bag - An activity handbook developed for this study with a range of activities for fathers and children to complete at home between sessions. The activities include goal setting, fundamental movement skill practice, physical activity tracking and home challenges that match each session theme (e.g. nutrition, screen time, physical activity) (approx. 30-minute time commitment per week). Both components will be delivered by local trained facilitators (qualified teachers and student teachers) at either the University of Newcastle or at local primary schools in the Newcastle region. All facilitators will attend a training course delivered by Professor Philip Morgan at the University of Newcastle where they will learn how to deliver the HYHD program and will receive resources to support their facilitation (e.g. facilitator manual). When translating evidence-based programs into real-world settings ongoing modifications are required based on the unique characteristics of the settings and populations. Modifications will be made to the program based on both outcome and process evaluation of each subsequent program implementation in 2019 and 2020. The goal will be to develop a comprehensive model of a real-world intervention for application in communities through updating materials, developing standardized train-the-trainer education and resources and ongoing evaluation of the intervention implementation with a final evaluation conducted in 2020.