The obesity interventions targeting pre-school children in America are still growing, but very few have culturally appropriate measures. The United States population is currently diverse as a result of an increase in multi-lingual and multi-cultural low-income families. Due to the rapid rise in poverty among the communities in the United States, healthcare institutions are encountered with challenges of handling malnutrition cases from low-income families. This paper is a discussion on the culturally appropriate health information for childhood obesity, which is cited to affect about 25% of the United States' pre-school children (National Institutes of Health 2015). In the course of the work, I will discuss on the health information required to address the paucity of obesity interventions which involves conducting a needs assessment and behavioral modification to manage the children obesity as attributed in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and National Institutes of Health (NIH).
The risk factors for childhood obesity include environmental, behavioral, and genetic predispositions, which cause variance in the body mass index (BMI). Parental obesity is one risk factor that exposes children to obesity as a result of family environmental influences. Sedentary behavior, often intake of fast foods and sweet drinks, imposes children in the risk of obesity (Center for Disease Control 2018). Several studies on the risk factors for childhood obesity have confirmed that eating a few family meals, not eating breakfast daily, and low fruit and vegetable consumption increases the risk of obesity among children. However, the challenging essence is the inability of children to report their dietary intake; most importantly, the Hispanic and non-Hispanic children with low literacy. Consequently, relying on the caregivers as the proxy reporters of the children's dietary behavior is a critical challenge because the caregivers are not competent with the children for long enough to know how they behave concerning the stated diet. On the other hand, some ethnic groups encounter challenges of poverty, which translates to mean that the children have no cognitive abilities to access doubly labeled water for the expected energy intake. Most ethnic groups have low incomes, and therefore it is complicated for caregivers and parents to track the desired eating habits of their children.
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Ultimately, the CDC cites obesity in children and other adolescents at or above the 95th percentile of the body mass index. According to the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHNES), the pervasiveness of obesity in children in the US is a critical issue as the health risk potentially leads to reduced quality of life among children as well as health problems. Further, NHNES provides information on the obesity prevalence by ethnicity, which presented 39.9% of Hispanic youth, 33.4% of the non-Hispanic black youth, and 25.3% of non-Hispanic white youth to be obese between 2014 and 2015 (National Institutes of Health 2015). Consequently, the Hispanics and non-Hispanic children are at high peril of suffering the obesity co-morbidity, such as type-2 diabetes and insulin resistance compared to the non-Hispanic white children. The BMI differs with the body fat towards ethnicity, and that is why the Hispanic and non-Hispanic children are more vulnerable to obesity. For instance, non-Hispanic black children have low body fat levels compared to non-Hispanic and Mexican-American white children at the same BMI. Thus it suggests that the BMI levels are not necessary for predicting the morbidity and mortality rates in all ethnic groups.
Many experts on childhood obesity recommend embracing a multi-factorial approach/ programs that target the ethnically diverse populations to improve retention and engagement. Such programs include the integration of both family-based and school-based approaches that focus on parental training, physical activities, and nutrition education. On the one hand, most of the ethnic groups in the United States that experience low incomes have low literacy and equally low health literacy. They are encountered with the challenge of access to healthcare resources, medical insurance, and limited culturally appropriate health promotion programs. Therefore, the needs assessment study evaluates the dietary habits, knowledge of health characteristics, and obesity treatment through the Health Matters for Families (HMFF). On the other hand, family-based programs such as low energy diets and increased physical activities are the best programs for children. As per 2007 Expert Committee Recommendations on treatment, prevention, and assessment of childhood obesity depends on a four-stage approach (Center for Disease Control 2018). The first stage, Prevention Plus, involves counseling for behavior change administered at the health care institutions. In the second and third stages, a dietician provides the diet plan for weight management. In the fourth stage, the severe cases that are inherent after trying the other stages are treated at the pediatric weight management center.
Obesity is an increasing pandemic in the United States, and it needs an early intervention to prevent the risk of consequent co-morbidities such as diabetes, heart diseases, and other problems in adulthood. The Hispanics are most vulnerable to obesity due to low incomes and low literacy. Additionally, the non-Hispanic white children are at lower risk of developing obesity than non-Hispanic black children in the same body mass index. Obesity can potentially lead to reduced quality of life, imposing the victims to the dangers of developing health problems, especially among the Hispanics who have challenges of reporting dietary information. Therefore, culturally appropriate health programs should be adopted for the ethnically diverse populations to improve their health structure. Most of the directives by the healthcare institutions target cultural factors in the ethnically diverse populations through a multi-factorial approach for childhood obesity prevention.
References
Center for Disease Control (2018). Childhood Obesity Facts. Retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/healthyschools/obesity/facts.htm
National Institutes of Health (2015). Children’s Health: Obesity. Turning Discovery Into Health . Retrieved from https://www.nih.gov/about-nih/what-we-do/nih-turning-discovery-into-health/childrens-health-obesity
