12-year old from Wilhelmshaven wins a bicycle in the European I.Family study

Wilhelmshaven and Delmenhorst are the areas where the European research project I.Family which is investigating the health and life styles of children and their families in eight countries is being run. Sweden, Spain, Italy, Hungary, Estonia, Cyprus and Belgium are the other countries participating in the project which is being coordinated by the Leibniz Institute for Prvention Research and Epidemiology - BIPS together with the University of Bremen.

The I.Family team raffled the bike (donated by FM-Bikes from Werlte) among more than 400 children who participated in the study in Wilhelmshaven and conscientiously completed the SACANA nutrition protocol three times. On the 11th of August, Dr. Maike Wolters, I.Family national coordinator from BIPS, presented the bike to the winner, the 12-year old Leana Winter in Wilhelmshaven. Recently, at the end of June, 13-year old Anna-Kristin Pfaff from Delmenhorst was the happy recipient of a Hollandrad (Dutch-bike) which I.Family had raffled among participating children.

Leana participated on the study in Wilhelmshaven together with her mother. After the summer holidays, Leana will be in the 7th grade at the high school Neues Gymnasium Wilhelmshaven. She enjoys cycling and skateboarding, plays the piano and sings in the school choir. While she admits that she likes eating fast food, she says that she rarely does so. At home she gets salad and vegetables, and they don't eat a lot of meat. Leana has been taking part in the examinations since IDEFICS, the predecessor of the I.Family study. She finds the study cool: she had fun taking part and excitedly awaits the results. She also enjoyed filling out the SACANA nutrition protocol. Dr. Wolters points out: "We really hope that we will find participants who are as willing and committed as Leana for the upcoming further investigations."