Introduction
Rates of overweight and obesity have increased in the United States during the previous few decades. The complexities of interconnected causative variables that lead to obesity must be handled within the socio-cultural movement of population groups. Unfortunately, obesity affects most Hispanic adolescents at a young age. Obesity is twice as common among Hispanic children aged 6–11 as it is in non-Hispanic White children of the same age, but it is four times more common in children aged 2–5 (CDC, 2021). According to CDC (2021), “Obesity prevalence was 13.4% among 2- to 5-year-olds, 20.3% among 6- to 11-year-olds, and 21.2% among 12- to 19-year-olds; childhood obesity is also more common among certain populations.” Overweight affects some Hispanic populations disproportionately, most especially youngsters of Puerto Rican descent, and the combination of asthma with obesity is a growing health concern.
Another source of stress is the scarcity of data on Hispanic youth mental health performance. Despite the fact that research on Hispanic mental health services for children shows high rates of depression symptoms and high rates of alcohol use among Hispanic teenagers, they have insufficient access to mental health care. According to Kemp (2021), “the percent of Black and Hispanic teens with obesity increased significantly over the past decade, but the prevalence of obesity remained unchanged for non-Hispanic White adolescents and for young children, according to data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES)” (p. 1208). This study emphasizes the need for improved data to acquire a better knowledge of the health condition of Hispanic children. Also, it studies the aid in the development of preventative programs that address the needs of this demographic: increasing healthcare access, particularly mental health care.
Literature Review
Child obesity has been linked to serious health hazards such as an elevated risk of high triglycerides, hypertension, and a variety of orthopedic ailments. As the prevalence of childhood obesity among children rises over time, so will the number of children identified with these health problems. Although the obesity epidemic affects all children, children of race are disproportionately affected. According to current studies, Latinos, African Americans, and American Indians have greater rates of obesity. Consequently, the obesity epidemic among California’s Hispanic community is still an issue in these neighborhoods.
Being overweight is not only associated with a bad diet but also with a lack of physical exercise. In that case, They have a higher chance of having a higher BMI, which will lead to overweight or obesity—developing a regular physical exercise regimen as a youngster aids in the fight against overweight and associated disorders. Regular activity is what permits our bodies to be efficiently exercised and is required for good conduction. If children do not get enough physical exercise, their bodies will lack the necessary processes to stay healthy. Furthermore, because of a lack of extensibility, they may not be able to expand to their full potential. As a result, the chance of developing or maintaining obesity is increased.
Childhood lays the groundwork for lifetime health. Furthermore, nothing offers a more immersing experience for children from outside home life than the amount of time they spend at school. This means that educators have a unique chance to enhance kid nutrition and combat obesity at the optimal time—before issues arise. One of the most important routes that schools may utilize to positively impact health is also one that is most perfectly in line with the organization’s mission: education. Healthy eating and physical activity classes may be integrated into core classroom topics, physical education, and after-school activities to teach kids skills that will help them adopt and maintain healthy lives. In addition to providing evidence-based dietary and physical activity messaging, school physical education should concentrate on getting children involved in high-quality and consistent strength training.
Sharon Cooper’s research attempts to determine the frequency of cardiovascular disease risk factors in a Hispanic teenage school population in south Texas. This study found that Hispanic high school students in south Texas had a significant frequency of general and abdominal overweight, AN, and HBP. The limitations of this study included the constraint on the sample size that was adequate to detect increases in the health outcomes between migrants and other students. This study showed a high prevalence of HBP readings among boys and the nearly fourfold higher prevalence among male students compared with female students (approximately 49% of boys and 14% of girls). Furthermore, the findings are concerning in terms of a higher incidence of cardiac diseases among these high schoolers, as well as the potential negative future direction of these risk variables.
Outside of the lecture, schools may improve health by allowing kids to eat properly and keep active. Schools may enhance nutrition by including better meal options in the cafeteria and eliminating the promotion of harmful foods. Schools should promote active recess time and design safe walking and bike paths to school to increase exercise. According to PMC (2021), “one hundred and ninety-nine children and their parents were recruited at an elementary school. Parents completed a questionnaire regarding their children’s grandparents’ involvement as caretakers and the feeding and physical activity practices of that grandparent when with the child” (p. 274). Health plans for teachers and staff may also play a significant effect in enhancing the teaching atmosphere, not only by improving faculty and staff health but also by increasing school-wide enthusiasm for student-centered initiatives.
Furthermore, schools may be valuable data sources for student health. Anonymized, school-level data on indicators such as kids’ body mass index (BMI) might assist educators and regulators in evaluating the efficacy of current initiatives and determine future initiatives’ directions. According to Liu et al. (2016), “obesity prevention may need to be directed toward parents or children well before children enter grade-school” (p. 12). Schools are set to become a vital component of the battle against the epidemic of obesity, with clear evidence that school-based prevention programs may successfully-and without many additional resources-help children eat better, be more active, and attain healthy weights. The sooner the community activities, as with schooling in particular, the better.
Schools can assist in preventing obesity by providing healthy options in the lunchroom, restricting the availability and promotion of junk foods and sugary beverages, and making drinkable water to kids throughout the day. Implementing these kinds of adjustments in the school food environment, on the other hand, will be a difficult undertaking. For instance, in the United States, the Department of Agriculture has adopted new comprehensive school dinner recommendations that will enhance vegetables, fruit, and whole cereals while decreasing salt, fat content, and hydrogenated oils. Nevertheless, because of political constraints, the agency was unable to completely adopt the meal rules proposed by the Institute of Medicine’s expert group.
A parent’s education level and dietary knowledge are important factors in obesity in children. They were capable of giving culturally responsive training to parents by educating them to practice healthier eating habits, resulting in improved feeding and parenting behaviors by adopting a multilevel community-academic collaboration they built. This collaboration also includes parenting classes that stress food awareness and attitude improvement. The majority of the parents that took part in this collaboration were Latino, and half had salaries of less than $20,000. The majority of the Latino families that enrolled were low-income and had limited nutrition education, indicating that parental education and economic level can have an influence on the chance of obesity in children. This community-academic partnership is an issue strategy for racial minorities that can help reduce obesity in children in low-income families.
Moreover, parents may influence how their kids think about diet and agriculture and so influence their children’s odds of being fat. Parents who engage in mindful food parenting methods provide healthier foods at home for their children and involve them in meal planning exercises. Families who are more mindful of what their kids eat and their kid’s eating habits can have an indirect influence on their children’s health. More parents having access to healthy teaching and learning how to insight meditation when treating their kids might assist in reducing childhood obesity levels. Encouragement of awareness in families may be critical in assisting parents in improving what they feed their children in order to match their healthy eating objectives.
Hispanics in limited homes may rely on government assistance to afford nutritious meals. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is one form of government assistance (SNAP). This type of government support assists families in covering the expense of acquiring healthful meals, which they may otherwise be unable to afford. Latinos are anticipated to account for more than one-fifth of all SNAP members.
The study of Juan C-Lopez aims to examine the complex causal relationships among AN, obesity, and IR in Mexican Americans (MAs). The occurrence of AN increased by obesity status: normal weight (11%), overweight (53%), and obese (65%); by prediabetes status (47%); and by MS status (67%), respectively. Obesity is shown to be a direct contributor to AN, hyperinsulinemia, and other CMRFs in Mexican American children. Acanthosis nigricans (AN) is a strong correlate of obesity and insulin resistance, and those affected with it are at a higher risk of developing T2DM.
The issue now is whether schools will be able to achieve the new dietary guidelines now that they are in place. It may be hard to respond to that question because compliance is not properly verified on a weekly basis. Furthermore, schools institutions confront a slew of other problems in developing a food environment in which the healthy option is the preferred option. Preparing the budget for the higher costs of purchasing and making preparations more healthy foods; persuading children to accept the more healthful options; and attempting to address the plethora of ways that extremely unhealthy beverages are retailed or continued to serve outside of school meals, from classroom birthday parties to school-wide fundraisers and athletic events, are some of the challenges.
Food and regular exercise must be included in a college health education program. Themes about healthy eating and physical activity can also be included in other parts of the curriculum, such as core academic topics, exercise science, and the after activities. School district health policy should include diet and physical exercise, as well as staff wellbeing, in addition to student health. Collecting kids’ BMIs on average can assist schools in monitoring the efficacy of obesity prevention activities. Testing students’ BMIs for personal health evaluation reasons is more contentious, necessitating discussions about confidentiality and parent interaction, among other concerns.
In addition, methods that enhance the home environment to increase the number of family dinners and encourage healthy parental involvement, such as regulating kid activities and reducing obesogenic activities, may play a significant role in obesity therapies. Another literature review that looked at the benefits of school-based educational interventions with a large number of Spanish-speaking students revealed inconclusive findings, with some studies indicating an effect in lowering obesity and improving healthcare behaviors while others did not. In fact, efforts that enhance the domestic environment can increase the frequency of family dinners, and encouraging healthy parenting behaviors such as regulating kid behaviors and reducing obesogenic behaviors may play an essential role in obesity therapies. Another literature review that looked at the benefits of education treatments in schools with a large number of Spanish-speaking students revealed inconsistencies, with some studies indicating an effect in lowering obesity and improving health behaviors while others did not.
As a result of the increasing epidemic of obesity, effective obesity treatment programs for low-income Latino kids are required. The majority of weight reduction research in adolescents has been done in non-Hispanic white populations. They do not address the unique hurdles to behavioral change faced by underprivileged groups. Despite attempts to remove barriers to intervention participation, teenage adherence and participation in clinic-based programs remain low. Moreover, because of the substantial ramifications for physical health, kids with glucose imbalance should be treated with psychological or pharmaceutical therapies, as suggested by the American Diabetes Association.
Overweight and insulin regulation are serious health issues impacting Spanish-speaking kids, but the protracted consequences for adult health remain unknown. Obesity has been linked to family and environmental factors; however, the majority of data comes from cross-sectional research. Conversely, the impact of obesity on cardiovascular events has been primarily demonstrated in cross-sectional research. Overweight and cardiovascular risk varies by gender, but less is known about the variables that put Spanish-speaking males at a greater risk for these illnesses. Furthermore, progress has been made in developing obesity preventive methods for Spanish-speaking youngsters, although the work is far from complete. Recurrent research is needed to better comprehend cardiovascular risk throughout infancy, youth, and the shift to adult. Future research should look at gender disparities in cardiovascular events. There is also a necessity for effective interventions that have been carefully researched and can meet the variety of Spanish-speaking youngsters in the United States.
As part of the treatment, food instruction was provided to parents during monthly “family dinners” and to adolescents in the classroom context. The American Academy of Pediatrics-recommended technique of culturally adapting important obesity prevention messaging and providing learning is based on the Social Learning Theory has already been outlined. A food expert from the University of California Cooperative Extension (UCCE) taught a multilingual local nutrition educator to teach the family night program. Each program lasted around one hour and included a lecture, a hands-on exercise, and a culinary presentation. Small-group sessions were provided to 15 or fewer parents many mornings and nights each month to suit family schedules.
Youngsters in the intervention community received a science-based nutrition curriculum aligned with California state requirements from UCCE nutrition experts and classroom instructors. According to the number of sessions recorded by teachers, 65 percent of pupils received seven or more sessions, not counting dessert buffet activities. UCCE and the Fresno County Department of Public Health decided to postpone the implementation of additional dietary and physical activity programs in the treatment and comparative communities until the completion of the NSFS. Nonetheless, over the three years of the treatment, 13 teachers in the comparison community and 56 teachers in the intervention community gave nutrition classes to their pupils. Moreover, throughout a three-year period, we met with community leaders quarterly to establish contact regarding health promotion efforts. While such events did take place in both areas, none of them was anything more than standard public healthcare outreach initiatives.
According to the forum’s presenters, circumstances that contribute to obesity disproportionately affect Latino populations. Income, schooling, unemployment, housing circumstances, and the local environment all have a significant impact on whether or not people eat healthy foods and participate in a physical exercise where they reside. Too many of these neighborhoods lack safe locations for physical exercise or comprehensive grocery shops; instead, hungry youngsters shop at convenience stores or liquor stores, where they are tempted by chips. Nevertheless, new initiatives by a range of Latino communities are demonstrating how areas may become healthier environments by lobbying for effective dietary and physical activity policy, system change, and local transformation.
Lecturers from the California Center for Public Health Advocacy (CCPHA) and PHI’s Central California Regional Obesity Prevention Program (CCROPP) discussed their effective efforts to integrate and encourage area citizens to workers and leaders health issues, learn leadership qualities, and pursue environmental changes such as the relationship between food sports and educational activity in colleges and safe roads proposals to control and minimize overweight. People on the Move (POTM), a Healthy Eating, Active Communities initiative administered by CCPHA, collaborated with the local public school system to increase the importance of physical sports and educational exercise. Four years later, the BMI of fifth, seventh, and ninth students in Baldwin Park, a community east of downtown Los Angeles, had reduced by several percent.
Summary
To conclude, the prevalence of overweight in the United States has risen dramatically over the last decade. The intricacies of interrelated causal elements that contribute to obesity must be addressed within the context of demographic group socio-cultural mobility. Obesity strikes Hispanic teenagers at an early age. Regardless of the fact that research on Hispanic mental health services for children suggests that Hispanic teens have high rates of depressive symptoms and high rates of alcohol use, they have limited access to mental health treatment. Furthermore, child obesity has been connected to major health risks such as an increased chance of excessive triglyceride levels, hypertension, and a number of orthopedic disorders. The number of children identified with these health concerns will grow in tandem with the incidence of childhood obesity among youngsters.
To be obese is related not just to a poor diet but also to a lack of physical activity. Assume a child is accustomed to consuming candies and sugary beverages or meals. In that case, children are more likely to have a higher BMI, leading to excess weight; a physically active program as a youngster aids in the avoidance of obesity and its associated disorders. Moreover, they would be unable to attain their maximum potential due to a lack of flexibility. As a consequence, the probability of developing or maintaining overweight increases.
Childhood health is the foundation for lifelong health. Moreover, nothing provides a more immersive experience for youngsters away from home than the length of time they spend in the classroom. One of the essential avenues schools may take to improve health is also one that is most closely aligned with the company’s objectives: education. Healthy food and physical exercise lessons may be blended into core classroom themes, exercise science, and after-school programs to teach children the skills they need to adapt and stay fit and healthy. In addition to offering evidence-based nutrition and physical activity recommendations, primary school fitness should focus on getting students interested in high-quality, regular strength training.
Aside from the lecture, schools may enhance students’ health by eating well and staying active. Schools may improve nutrition by providing more nutritious lunch options in the cafeteria and avoiding the marketing of unhealthy meals. Schools should promote active recess time and construct safe walking and biking pathways to school to boost fitness. Teachers’ and staff’s health plans may also play an essential part in improving the teaching environment, not only by improving faculty and staff wellness but also by generating school-wide excitement for student-centered activities.
Additionally, schools may be useful data sources for school health. Anonymized education data on variables such as children’s body mass index (BMI) may aid educators as well as regulators in assessing the success of present activities and setting future courses. Schools are poised to become a critical component in the fight against the obesity epidemic, with compelling evidence that school-based prevention programs may help children eat healthier, be more active, and achieve healthy diets while requiring few extra resources.
Schools can help prevent obesity by offering healthy lunch alternatives, limiting the availability and promotion of junk foods and sugary beverages, and providing students with potable water throughout the day. Implementing such changes in the school dining environment, on the other hand, will be a challenging task. The education level and nutritional awareness of a parent are major determinants of childhood obesity. By establishing multilevel community-academic cooperation, they were able to provide culturally appropriate training to parents by teaching them better-eating patterns, resulting in improved feeding and parenting practices. Parenting programs that emphasize dietary knowledge and attitude enhancement are also part of this relationship.
Furthermore, parents may impact how their children think about eating and agriculture, and so influence their children’s chances of becoming overweight. Parents that practice mindful food parenting prepare healthier foods for their children at home and involve them in meal planning exercises. Families that are more attentive to how and what their children eat might have an independent effect on their personal health. The problem now is whether colleges will keep up with changing dietary needs now that they have been put in place. Responding to that issue may be difficult because compliance is not fully reviewed on a weekly basis. Additionally, schools face a plethora of other challenges in creating a dining environment in which the healthy option is the preferred one.
A collegiate health education curriculum must incorporate food and frequent activity. Healthy food and physical activity themes can also be included in other aspects of the curriculum, such as core academic topics, exercise science, and after-school activities. In addition to student health, school district health policies should include diet and physical activity and staff wellbeing. Collecting average BMIs for children can help schools measure the effectiveness of obesity prevention efforts. Additionally, methods that enhance the family environment in order to maximize the number of family dinners and support healthy student support, such as restricting kid activities and eliminating obesogenic activities, may be useful in obesity therapy. Another review of the literature on the impact of classroom intervention programs with a significant number of Spanish-speaking children discovered inconsistencies, with some studies indicating an effect in lowering overweight and improving health practices while others did not.
Because of the high incidence of obesity, overweight treatment programs for limited Ethnic minority students are critical. The bulk of weight loss research in teenagers has been done in non-Hispanic white populations, and it does not address the particular barriers to behavioral change experienced by disadvantaged groups. Overweight and insulin control are important health concerns affecting Spanish-speaking children, but the long-term effects on adult health are unknown. Obesity has been related to genetic and environmental variables; however, the bulk of evidence comes from cross-sectional studies. In contrast, the influence of obesity on cardiovascular events has mostly been proven in cross-sectional studies. Overweight and cardiovascular risk differ by gender, but less is known about the factors that put Spanish-speaking guys at a higher risk for these diseases.
The Social Learning Theory-based American Academy of Pediatrics-recommended approach of culturally adjusting crucial obesity prevention information and imparting learning has previously been detailed. A food specialist from the University of California Cooperative Extension (UCCE) taught the family night program to a bilingual local nutrition educator. Each session lasted around one hour and consisted of a lecture, a hands-on activity, and a food demonstration. UCCE nutrition specialists and classroom instructors provided a science-based nutrition program matched with California state standards to children in the intervention neighborhood. In terms of the number of sessions documented by instructors, 65 percent of students got seven or more sessions, not including dessert buffet activities. UCCE and the Fresno County Department of Public Health agreed to delay the deployment of other food and physical activity initiatives in the treatment and comparative areas until the NSFS was completed.
Wealth, education, poverty, housing conditions, and the local environment all have a big influence on whether or not individuals consume healthy foods and exercise where they live. Too many of these communities lack secure places for physical activity or complete food stores; instead, hungry children shop at corner shops or bodegas, where they are lured by chips. Lecturers from the California Center for Public Health Advocacy (CCPHA) and PHI’s Central California Regional Obesity Prevention Program (CCROPP) debated their efficient order to incorporate and empower area residents to work on health issues with workers and leaders, learn leadership skills, and pursue changes in the environment such as the relationship between food sports and educational activity in colleges and safe roads propositions to regulate and reduce obese people. People on the Move (POTM), a CCPHA-managed Healthy Eating, Active Communities project, cooperated with the school system to improve the importance of physical sports and cognitive activity.
References
CDC. (2021). Childhood obesity facts | overweight & obesity | CDC.
Kemp, C. (2021). Prevalence of obesity rises among black, hispanic teens. American Academy of Pediatrics.
Liu, G. C., Hannon, T., Qi, R., Downs, S. M., & Marrero, D. G. (2016). The obesity epidemic in children: Latino children are disproportionately affected at younger ages. International Journal of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, 2(1), 12-18.
PMC. (2021). Hispanic children and the obesity epidemic: Exploring the role of abuelas.