Expanding a Program to Help Clinics and Families Take Steps to Reduce Childhood Obesity

Project Summary

PCORI implementation projects promote the use of findings from PCORI-funded studies in real-world healthcare and other settings. These projects build toward broad use of evidence to inform healthcare decisions.

	This PCORI-funded implementation project is expanding a healthy weight program for children to new clinics to help children with obesity or overweight improve their health.
Childhood obesity or overweight affects millions of children in the United States. Children with obesity may develop health problems in the future, such as heart disease or high blood pressure. Children who have obesity are also at risk for low self-esteem and depression.

What is the goal of this implementation project?

Healthy weight programs can help children with obesity or overweight manage their weight. A PCORI-funded research study looked at two programs to help doctors identify children with obesity and provide counseling to them.In these programs, parents receive educational materials and resource guides as well as monthly text message prompts. One program also included health coaching and extra text messages. After two years, children in both programs had lower body mass index, or BMI. BMI is based on a person’s height and weight.

This project is expanding the combined program to clinics in communities with limited resources in three states to help children achieve a healthy weight.

What will this project do?

The project team is working with staff to make the program part of standard well-child visits at three healthcare organizations. Clinicians, such as doctors or nurses, use information in the child’s electronic health record, or EHR, to help them identify and counsel children with obesity.

The project team is working with staff to:

Adapt and add resources, such as alerts and templates, to EHR systems to help identify children and follow up with families
Provide information to clinicians on how to manage children’s weight
Identify clinician champions and practice coaches at each site to support training and use of the healthy weight program
Train clinic teams to use the program
Provide ongoing coaching and support for staff
Create a guide to help other clinics adopt the program

What is the expected impact of this project?

The project is expanding the program and demonstrating what’s required to put the program in place at clinics serving communities with few resources.

About 18,000 children with overweight or obesity will receive support through the project. The project evaluation will confirm that the program is working as intended to help manage children’s weight.

More about this implementation project:

Stakeholders Involved in This Project

Site-level executive leadership
Clinical leaders and practice teams at all implementation sites
Epic representatives

Implementation Strategies

Adapt the program to work with sites’ existing resources and workflows, including integrating a text messaging system for families and a clinical decision support tool into EHR.
Create and support implementation teams at sites.
Train local practice teams using online educational modules and academic detailing.
Provide sites with tools to support implementation, including best practice guidance, trainings, and structured note templates in the EHR.
Provide educational materials to families, including handouts, after-visit summaries, and community resource guides.
Use a phased implementation approach.
Identify and prepare clinician champions.
Provide technical assistance, including practice facilitation, coaching, and ongoing consultation.
Partner with national stakeholder organization to promote implementation and dissemination.
Develop an implementation guide to support further use of the program at other sites.
Offer continuing education credits.

Evaluation Outcomes

To document implementation:

Provider use of EHR tool
Number of parents receiving text messages
Fidelity of intervention delivery
Acceptability of the program to clinicians

To assess healthcare and health outcomes:

Provision of nutrition and physical activity counseling
Parent assessment of care
Child BMI

Journal Citations

Related Journal Citations

Project Information

Principal Investigator Principal Investigator The lead researcher and primary contact for the project. View Glossary:

Elsie Taveras, MD, MPH

Organization Organization The institution/organization in which the project originates, or the primary institution or organization that received funding for the project. View Glossary:

Massachusetts General Hospital

Project Budget:

$2,725,539

Project Title Project Title The original title of the project supplied by the principal investigator or project lead/team. View Glossary:

Dissemination and Implementation of Effective Childhood Obesity Treatment Innovations

Key Dates

Board Approval Date Board Approval Date The date of approval to fund by the PCORI Board of Governors. The actual project start dates vary as the negotiation of project milestones must be completed before the contract can be fully executed. View Glossary:

July 2018

Project End Date Project End Date Includes the research project period and may be subject to modification to allow other research-related activities such as peer review. View Glossary:

December 2022

Year Awarded Year Awarded The year that funding for the project was approved, or the year the proposal received a notice of award. View Glossary:

2018

Study Registration Information

HSR Project Number:

HSRP20192324

Initial PCORI-Funded Research Study

This implementation project focuses on putting findings into practice from this completed PCORI-funded research study: Do Weight Management Programs Involving Health Coaches Improve Body Mass Index and Parent Empowerment for Children with Obesity or Who Are Overweight?

PCORI

About

Research

Impact

Highlights of PCORI-Funded Research Results

Topics

Engagement

Funding Opportunities

Applicant and Awardee Resources

Jump to Section