Journal of Community Medicine & Health Education
Open Access

Research Article

Implementing Child-focused Activity Meter Utilization into the Elementary School Classroom Setting Using a Collaborative Communitybased Approach

^{1Department of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, USA}

²Division of Child and Adolescent Psychology, Department of Psychiatry and Psychology, USA

³Department of Family Medicine, USA

⁴Division of Pediatric Endocrinology, Department of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, USA

⁵Division of Endocrinology, Department of Medicine, USA

⁶Section of Patient Education, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN, USA

*Corresponding Author:

Brian A Lynch
Department of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine
200 First Street SW, Rochester, MN 55905, USA
Tel: +507-266-4936
Fax: 507-284-9744
E-mail: lynch.brian@mayo.edu

Received date: October 13, 2015; Accepted date: November 20, 2015; Published date: November 25, 2015

Citation: Lynch BA, Jones A, Biggs BK, Kaufman T, Cristiani V, et al. (2015) Implementing Child-focused Activity Meter Utilization into the Elementary School Classroom Setting Using a Collaborative Community-based Approach. J Community Med Health 5:379. doi: 10.4172/2161-0711.1000379

Copyright:© 2015 Lynch BA, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Introduction: The prevalence of pediatric obesity has increased over the past 3 decades and is a pressing public health program. New technology advancements that can encourage more physical in children are needed. The Zamzee program is an activity meter linked to a motivational website designed for children 8-14 years of age. The objective of the study was to use a collaborative approach between a medical center, the private sector and local school staff to assess the feasibility of using the Zamzee Program in the school-based setting to improve physical activity levels in children.

Methods: This was a pilot 8-week observational study offered to all children in one fifth grade classroom. Body mass index (BMI), the amount of physical activity by 3-day recall survey, and satisfaction with usability of the Zamzee Program were measured pre- and post-study.

Results: Out of 11 children who enrolled in the study, 7 completed all study activities. In those who completed the study, the median (interquartile range) total activity time by survey increased by 17 (1042) minutes and the BMI percentile change was 0 (8). Both children and their caregivers found the Zamzee Activity Meter (6/7) and website (6/7) “very easy” or “easy” to use.

Conclusion: The Zamzee Program was found to be usable but did not significantly improve physical activity levels or BMI. Collaborative obesity intervention projects involving medical centers, the private sector and local schools are feasible but the effectiveness needs to be evaluated in larger-scale studies. 

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