Addressing Childhood Obesity in New Hampshire

1. Addressing Childhood Obesity in New Hampshire Tammy Levesque Community Health Educator Lakes Region Partnership for Public Health Power Point provided by José Thier Montero, MD Director NH DPHS

2. What is Public Health? An Agency That : • Responds to public health threats and emerging issues • Delivers high quality evidence-based services • Aims to reduce suffering and death due to chronic and communicable diseases • Uses a population based approach to improve health

3. HEAL-Lakes Region • HEAL is the NH Obesity Prevention Plan • HEAL is an acronym for Healthy Eating Active Living • The Foundation for Healthy Communities implements the HEAL plan with support, funding, and technical assistance from the DHHS Obesity Prevention Program (OPP) and several private foundations

4. NH Childhood Obesity Data Sources • Pediatric Nutrition Surveillance System • NH Head Start Study • Third Grade Study • Youth Risk Behavior Survey

5. NH Childhood Obesity Data • Low income children, 2-5 years old 15.5% • Head Start Children, 3-5 years old 18.4% • Third graders in public schools 18.0% • High school students12.4%

6. NH Obesity Risk Factor Data Inadequate Physical Activity High school students 45.3% males 47.1% females 62.9% Excessive Television Viewing (>3 hrs/day) Low income children, 2 to 5 years old 12.7% High school students 23% males 27.1% females 18.6%

7. NH Obesity Risk Factor Data Inadequate Fruit and Vegetable Consumption High school students 77.7% Excess Soft Drink Consumption High school students 22.1% males 29.7% females 14.5%

8. NH Obesity Risk Factor Data Excess Non-Schoolwork Computer Use (>3 hrs per day) High school students 23.9% males 30.9% females 16.6%

9. What should we do ?

10. How do you control obesity? • Controlling obesity will require substantial investments by many segments of society • Policy efforts to increase physical activity and promote healthy eating are needed

11. Actions for controlling obesity? • Use the CDC Target Areas for Obesity Prevention • Provide technical assistance to increase policies that address each target area • Use surveillance and data to raise awareness • Recognize resource constraints and work with a variety of partners to help solve the problem • Change the context to make the healthy choice the default choice

12. CDC Target Areas for Obesity Prevention • Increase physical activity • Increase consumption of fruits and vegetables • Increase breastfeeding • Decrease consumption of sugar sweetened beverages • Decrease consumption of energy dense foods • Decrease TV viewing

13. Childhood Obesity in NH Schools are an appropriate place for policies that improve student health and academic performance.

14. Win:Win Solutions Physical Activity Is Associated With: • Better academic performance - eleven peer reviewed published studies found that participation in regular physical activity is associated with improved academic performance

15. Increase Physical Activity

16. Movement Breaks JAM Sessions

17. Sugary Beverage Education

18. Extension of Fruit & Vegetable Grant into Middle School

19. Positive Messaging on Portions & Choices

20. School Gardens at all 5 Schools and 8 Child care centers in region

21. We know we can’t do it all.It takes time!!!!Assess and re-assessUse Best PracticesFind the low hanging fruitConnect with Champions!

22. Technical Assistance NH Department of Health and Human Services Division of Public Health Services Obesity Prevention Program 603-271-4551