Healthy Weight for Healthy
Kids
Gaston
This
generation of American children may be the first to live shorter lives than
their parents. According to data
from the
Recognizing
the potentially terrible consequences of inaction, the Gaston Community Health
Care Commission sponsored a Community Youth Obesity Summit on
Youth Obesity
SESSION SUMMARY
Session Goals:
¨ To gather citizen input on important needs and issues for addressing youth obesity in the Gaston Community
¨
To identify causes for youth obesity in
¨ To prioritize these causes according to perceived importance
¨ To develop potential solutions and resources needed to address identified causes
Session Overview:
Attendees at the Youth Obesity Summit were divided into six discussion groups following a presentation by Sheree Thaxton, Healthy Weight Coordinator, from the North Carolina Department of Public Health. Eighty participants registered with an additional eight individuals joining the discussion groups after registration closed. Five discussion groups were adults and one group was composed of children ranging from elementary school to high school. Trained facilitators lead the discussion groups designed to allow participants to provide feedback to the following questions:
The session agenda and facilitator’s guide is attached for reference.
Summary:
CAUSES OF YOUTH
OBESITY
The compiled results of the six discussion groups targeted
six causes. Although the groups may have
worded the causes or prioritized the causes somewhat differently as they chose
the top three, the discussions were very consistent across groups. These causes are prioritized based upon the
number of groups that identified the cause as one of the top three.
Specific recommendations for solutions can be grouped into the following categories listed without regard to priority.
¨ Educate consumers of all ages on the importance of and how to make healthy nutritional decisions. This information is important for parents who are making nutritional decisions for children and for all adults who serve as role models and/or have the opportunity to influence nutritional decisions among children.
Who: Service Providers, Parents, Schools Media, and Physicians
¨ Newsletter, TV ads, billboards with healthy nutrition information
Serving sizes
Food choices
Healthy cooking
¨ Community Health Fair
Glycemic information
Normal BMI
¨ Church and civic group forums/presentations
Parenting skills and how to make healthy choices
Reward systems with non-food rewards
¨ More life skills/home skills training for boys and girls
School nutrition classes
¨ Meal Planner in the newspaper
¨ Work with grocery stores to highlight nutrition
¨ Public Access Channel with kid friendly information
¨ Kiosks in stores
¨ Designated healthy choice restaurants
¨ Education in school cafeterias
¨ Promote and/or facilitate active lifestyles for citizens of all ages. In keeping with the importance of the role of significant adults in modeling healthy behaviors, the need to increase physical activity for all ages was perceived as critical to increasing the activity level for children. This solution also includes removing barriers such as eliminating safety concerns and increasing access.
Who: Parents, Schools, PTO, Agencies, Business
¨ Increase church organized sports
¨ Promote neighborhood sports/physical activity groups
¨ Promote family activity time with decreased computer, video, and TV time
¨ Provide community playgrounds
¨
Don’t restrict PE as punishment
¨ Expand walkways/sidewalk infrastructure
¨ Improve lighting and parking areas at tracts and parks
¨ Increase bike lanes
¨ Open church and school gyms for public use in off hours
¨ Involve Parks and Recreation in after school intramurals
¨ Address social and mental health issues. Depression, distorted self-perceptions, and other unhealthy emotional issues are viewed as contributors to poor nutrition and general unhealthy lifestyle choices.
Who: School counselors
¨ Provide psychosocial counseling, behavior change modeling
¨ School and community support groups
¨ Positive self-image program
¨ Improve access to and expand available resources. General group consensus centered on the recognition that in many cases available resources are under-utilized due to lack of information, access, or broad availability.
¨ Get the work out about resources
¨ Make community resources more affordable
¨ Publicize Web-site
¨ Develop and include resource information in the Gaston Answer Book
¨ Gather data that clearly defines the problem and tracks progress. Although data collection and tracking progress is technically viewed as a tool to measure the success of solution implementation, participants believe that definitive data could target efforts and identify under-served needs.
Who: Service Providers, Health Department, Primary Care Provider, Schools
¨ Visit other communities to study successful initiative
¨ Maintain data base to track youth obesity
¨ Influence public policy to promote healthy lifestyles. Within the greater community system, participants identified policies and norms that reinforce unhealthy behavior.
Who: Service Providers, Parents, Schools, Media, Physicians
¨ Remove vending machines from schools
¨ Tax fast food/junk food
¨ Open more affordable after school care
¨ Promote community/neighborhood unity for healthy lifestyles
¨ Emphasize nutrition in school lunch preparation
¨ Correct deceptive labeling and advertising
¨ Counter marketing and commercials promoting poor nutrition
¨ Mandate healthy choice in vending machines
¨ Promote insurance coverage for obesity treatment
A full listing of solutions discussed by the groups is attached.
SUMMARY OF FOCUS GROUP – YOUTH OBESITY
CAUSES:
Eating the wrong foods and too much
Inactivity
Distractions from exercise – TV, computer, etc.
Corporate enticement – soda machine at school
Economic, financial restraints – junk food is cheaper
Excess snacking during TV & computer
Demise of family meal time
Lack of time – convenience of fast food
Lack of appropriate after school care for Elementary and Middle School children
Lack of knowledge by parents
Lack of resource availability
Not taking advantage of resources
Disappearance of playground and physical education in school
Not enough recreational activities for kids besides organized sports
Parental image of kids – okay for kid to be large
Environmental influences – marketing/commercials
Inappropriate body image
Overweight parents
Peer pressure – following what friends eat
Cultural acceptance especially in Hispanic community
Time constraints – less free time in schools
Sedentary lifestyle
Nutritional issues – school lunches, drink machines, fast food, “biggie” size
Eating for comfort when emotional needs aren’t met
Environment – sprawling communities with lack of sidewalks, parks, wt. Loss support programs
Language barriers
Lack of parental nutritional knowledge beyond basics
Multi-family (divorced, separated, single, grandparents, care givers) with different expectations
Too much eating out
Dysfunctional families/mental issues
Exercise isn’t a priority
Fear of child’s safety – transportation to activities or events
3 hours of homework and other activities
Teachers not interested in physical education
Not recognizing that breakfast is important
Middle school and high school – overweight can’t play
Lack of role model for healthy lifestyle
Foods as reward/punishment
High calorie fluids, foods
Rushing children to eat faster
No portion control – all you can eat
No skills in reading labels and making healthy choices
Stress
Apathy
Socio-Economic Status
Genetics
Depression
Too much saturated fat in the diet
SOLUTIONS:
Teach healthy, economical choices
Buy in season – on sale
Healthy recipes in lifestyle classes
Food preparation – easy, healthy meals
Recipes sent home with kids
Drink more water
Check labels
Eliminate drink/snack machines in schools
Offer healthier options for food choices in schools
Educate consumers to make informed choices
Use PTO,
PTA,
Take advantage of resources
Have safe, supervised play areas/parks for free structured activities
Add bike lanes
Make it a family affair
Provide lighted walking tracks, greenway
Intramural activities after school
More physical activity
Offer more varied physical activity to meet needs of more people
More family activity time
Offer more free availability to recreational facilities
Conduct community Health Fair
Enlist aid of communities, churches and organizations to promote sports, healthy eating habits, and free access to recreational areas
Enlist aid of Health Care Commission in educating parents and children
Improve self-esteem
Public awareness:
Nutrition,
Health issues
Positive aspects of weight management
Availability of community resources
Parental education
Provide quality community resources
Pursue grant monies for creating or expanding
Increase access for obese kids to outside activity
Use widespread advertising education regarding community resources
Provide counseling services for kids suffering from emotional, stress related or depression problems
Teach sensitivity awareness
Teach self-discipline, behavior modification
Data base of resources for professionals
Data collection (Health Dept. and DHHS collaboration)
Primary care providers
Schools
Public health
Visit other communities/study their action plans and results
Take services to community
Better promotion – Bilingual
Reward exercise
More programs for overweight children
Form community walk groups
Make it safer for children to be outside playing, walking, exercising
More boys and girls clubs that will include some physical exercise in after school programs
More boys and girls clubs that will include some physical exercise in after school programs
Continue PE classes through middle school and high school
Include daily exercise in school setting
Start nutrition classes early childhood
Personal responsibility
Encourage positive re-enforcement
Mandate healthy snack choices if vending machine at school
Education in schools cafeterias K-12
Public policy i.e. certified Healthy Heart Restaurant
Gaston Answer Book
Send flyers home with students
Provide incentives for employees in workplace
Exercise at least 2 hours per day
Require participation in various extracurricular activities, ex. Cheerleading, sports, band, etc.
Publicize web sites with information
Tax on “fast food”, “junk food”
Insurance coverage for obesity/weight
Discontinue school fundraisers related to junk food
Signage in super markets to show healthy choices
Try to influence food industry to discontinue super size in foods
Stress management
Limit TV, computer, video games, etc.
Control availability of foods at home
Structured family meal time
School Board need to be involved
Community garden
Promote Farmers Market