Doctors of Nursing Practice in action: Creating a community partnership to reduce childhood obesity

Background and Issues: Childhood obesity has become a national epidemic, with about 35% of children presently overweight or at risk for overweight. According to the CDC, during the past 20 years, the percentage of overweight children has more than tripled. ABC University is affiliated with Pediatric System, a children's health system dedicated to making significant clinical, scientific, preventative and educational advances to improve the lives of children. One of the areas of emphasis of Pediatric System's Health and Prevention Services division is obesity prevention.

Description: ABC's Doctor of Nursing Practice Program (DNP) seeks to prepare nurses to lead, serve and practice at the most advanced levels in a complex health care system. The DNP program of study is concentrated on scholarly practice, health policy, quality, safety, leadership, organizational dynamics and population health. Faculty sought to create an innovative, community-based student experience that would span 3 consecutive practice-based courses and become an exemplar for utilizing expanded knowledge and skill. Students determined that an ideal path was to leverage the

ABC-Pediatric System partnership to provide an intervention to combat childhood obesity. Concurrently, students have sought guidance from advocacy organizations focused on overweight and/or at-risk children.

Lessons Learned: Strengthening pre-existing partnerships can be a win-win for all parties. Moving an idea to action takes time, patience and communication from all participants.

Recommendations: Practice-based doctoral students should be encouraged, and perhaps required, to serve the University and greater community by developing programs that can be expanded by future doctoral cohorts.