School-Based Intervention Works to Reduce Obesity

SCHOOL-BASED INTERVENTION WORKS TO REDUCE OBESITY

NEW ORLEANS -- For the first time, a school-based health behavior intervention has been shown to reduce obesity in children.

The intervention, called Planet Health, was developed by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health. Rather than create a separate health class or an entirely distinct curriculum, Planet Health "infuses" existing curricula and classes with health messages. The program stresses the health benefits of watching less television, decreasing consumption of high-fat foods, increasing fruit and vegetable intake, and getting more exercise.

Planet Health was tested in a randomized, controlled field trial in ten Massachusetts public schools over a two-year period. Sixth and seventh graders in five of the schools participated in Planet Health program; students in the same grades in the five control schools did not. A total of 1,295 children were involved. Outcomes assessed using pre-intervention (fall 1995) and follow-up (spring 1997) included prevalence, incidence, and remission of obesity.

The Harvard researchers found that prevalence of obesity among girls in the intervention schools was reduced compared to the girls in the control schools. (Obesity was defined by a composite indicator based on body mass index and triceps skinfolds). For boys, however, there was no difference. They also found that the Planet Health resulted in reduced television viewing by boys and girls in the five intervention schools, compared to the children in the five control schools.

Steven Gortmaker, the lead investigator and a senior lecturer in the Department of Health and Social Behavior, notes that other studies have suggested that clinically-based interventions, or interventions targeted at obese children, might be effective. "What is new and exciting about these study results is that they provide evidence that a school-based program can work to reduce obesity," he says. The fact that the intervention worked to reduce television viewing, which in other studies has been linked to obesity, is also heartening, he said.

Because Planet Health can be used without adding classes or hiring extra staff, it or similarly conceived health programs should be especially attractive to school administrators, Gortmaker adds.

Gortmaker's findings are in an abstract to be presented at the annual meeting of the Ambulatory Pediatrics Association in New Orleans, May 1-5.