Cultural-tailoring of a Childhood Obesity Prevention Program for Hispanic Families

Childhood obesity is a critical public health threat in the US. due to the increasing prevalence of obesity among children and adults over the past three decades. The rise in obesity parallels changes in the physical design of communities, changes in American dietary practices, decreases in physical activity, and increases in sedentary behavior. While this epidemic affects all socioeconomic levels, certain racial/ethnic groups are disproportionately affected, including Hispanics. This paper reports the process used to adapt the We Can! childhood obesity prevention program developed by National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute to be culturally-tailored for the Hispanic/Latino families, using a community-based participatory research (CBPR) approach. In the formative research phase, focus group data were collected to identify aspects of the We Can! program to modify to be culturally appropriate. The target age was chosen to be families with children ages 5-7 years. The objectives of the intervention are to improve healthy eating behaviors, increase physical activity and reduce sedentary behavior (screen time). The adapted intervention, called “Familias Saludables/Healthy Families,” used lay Health promoters (promotoras/promotores de salud) to deliver the intervention since previous research has demonstrated to be an effective strategy for delivering culturally-appropriate health promotion interventions in Hispanic communities. We report specific ways in which the intervention was culturally-tailored. We report results of a pilot test of the intervention using a randomized controlled design with 22 families, and how the pilot results were used to develop a subsequent randomized controlled trial of the Healthy Families intervention, which is ongoing.