American journal of preventive medicine
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Portion-size estimation is an important component of weight management. Literacy and numeracy skills may be important for accurate portion-size estimation. It was hypothesized that low literacy and numeracy would be associated with decreased accuracy in portion estimation. ⋯ In this study, many participants had poor portion-size estimation skills. Lower literacy skills were associated with less accuracy when participants were asked to serve a single serving. Opportunities may exist to improve portion-size estimation by addressing literacy.
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Comparative Study
Measuring food availability and access in African-American communities: implications for intervention and policy.
Obesity is a major public health concern in the U. S. As compared to whites, minority populations are disproportionately at risk, with the highest prevalence rates of overweight and obesity occurring among African American women. ⋯ A major challenge has been the need for reliable and valid measures to assess aspects of the neighborhood food environment that encourage or inhibit healthful eating behaviors and weight management. Investigators have made considerable gains in the development of tools and approaches to measure neighborhood food environments overall, but few studies focus on the specific challenges and issues associated with characterizing neighborhood food environments in communities of color. This paper highlights important considerations for measuring food environments in African-American neighborhoods and their implications for developing programmatic and policy solutions to reduce racial disparities in overweight.
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Comparative Study
Fatal all-terrain vehicle crashes: injury types and alcohol use.
Since the 1990s, West Virginia has led the U.S. in the per-capita death rate from all-terrain vehicle (ATV) crashes, with rates eight times the national average and continually increasing. A comprehensive assessment was conducted of ATV fatalities to provide critical guidance for community interventions and public health policy to prevent further deaths. ⋯ Fatal crash and injury types differ significantly depending on the location of ATV use, although alcohol and drug abuse are frequent risk factors in all types of ATV crashes. In addition to promoting helmet use, interventions are needed to address alcohol use among ATV users.
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The University of California at Irvine Interdisciplinary Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (ID-SURE) program had three objectives: (1) designing an interdisciplinary health promotion training curriculum for undergraduate research fellows; (2) developing measures for evaluating and assessing program-related educational processes and products; and (3) comparing these educational process and product measures between groups of students who did or did not receive the training. ⋯ The findings from this study offer evidence for the efficacy of the ID-SURE program for training undergraduate students in transdisciplinary concepts, methods, and skills that are needed for effective scientific collaboration. Additionally, this study makes two important contributions to the development and evaluation of interdisciplinary health research training programs: (1) It presents and evaluates a novel curriculum for training undergraduate students in interdisciplinary theories, concepts, and methods of health promotion that can be replicated in other settings and contexts; (2) It provides and tests the reliability of new measures for evaluating interdisciplinary collaborative processes and develops objective criteria for rating the integrative and intellectual quality of students' research products.
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The National Institute of Mental Health convened a meeting in October 2005 to review the literature on obesity, nutrition, and physical activity among those with mental disorders. The findings of this meeting and subsequent update of the literature review are summarized here. Levels of obesity are higher in those with schizophrenia and depression, as is mortality from obesity-related conditions such as coronary heart disease. ⋯ The minimal research on weight-management programs for those with mental disorders indicates that meaningful changes in dietary intake and physical activity are possible. Physical activity is an important component of any weight-management program, particularly for those with depression, for which a substantial body of research indicates both mental and physical health benefits. Obesity among those with mental disorders has not received adequate research attention, and empirically-based interventions to address the increasing prevalence of obesity and risk of cardiovascular and metabolic diseases in this population are lacking.