Overweight and Obesity - Report Example

Primary Prevention Project: Overweight and Obesity

Ramandeep Kaur

Western Governor University

Introduction

Overweight and obesity are some of the issues affecting the society. When detected early, people are in a position to maintain a healthy weight and avoid diseases that come from being obese. Unhealthy eating is one of the leading causes of being obese and overweight. Further, ignorance and lack of proper information about nutrients found in different types of food might cause people to eat meals that lead to their weight problems (Herring et al., 2012). Understanding the causes of obesity in the society will help people observe what they eat. It will also help develop a good tradition where people eat healthy meals at all times. Further, learning institutions will develop meal plans that assist the children under their care to start taking healthy foods from an age. It is worth noting that overweight and obesity affects people of all ages irrespective of their age. It also has a negative effect on the wellness of an individual if they do not take the proper precaution of changing the combination of foods they consume. Healthcare officials argue that the best step to ensure issues with overweight and obesity do not affect people is through prevention. This can only take place through taking a proper meal after understanding the benefits of having a manageable weight. With the development of technology, it is possible to reach out to a large number of people and educate them on healthy living. The current social media influence on decisions persons across diverse locations is a good platform to provide knowledge about healthy eating. Promoting health among people will increase the lifespan as one reduces the possibility of dying from overweight and obesity related issues.

Problem Description

The primary prevention topic is overweight and obesity for the people living in California State, with a special interest in Bakersfield town. The target populations for the study are those affected by the health concern, those working to prevent the possibility of developing the condition, and learning institutions that guide the society on healthy feeding from a young age. The population size is 100. Special demographics related to the population included young and old, men, and women, high and low income earners. The study used a population comprising of people from different races as they are all affected by overweight and obesity issues. The physical and social environment includes health care facilities, fitness centers, and learning institutions.

Health Disparity

Some of the evident disparities in Bakersfield are related to the economic power of people. Healthy foods are expensive and not all people can afford them. In addition, accessing and affording fitness fees when one has overweight and obesity is impossible for most people. This means that they can only commit themselves to exercising at home without proper guidance from the healthcare practitioners and nutritionists who work at such premises.

Data to Support Health Disparity

Data to support the health disparity claims is from on the high number of low-income earners in the town of Bakersfield ranging comprising about 75% of the entire population.

Current Primary Community and Prevention Resources

Some of the primary community and prevention resources include educating the community from a young age on the importance of eating healthy meals and maintaining their weight. Another applicable resource in the community includes the feeding health programs in the town of Bakersfield. For instance, Adventists Health Bakersfield Wellness Center gives food to the public free of charge. During this time, it educates those who care to know about how they can prepare healthy and simple meals at their homes. Senior citizens’ homes work with some healthcare providers to check their weight condition. They visit citizens so that they can help keep them on track and advise them on how to live longer.

Underlying Causes

Some of the underlying causes of overweight and obesity include genetic influences, unhealthy eating, and environment, lack of taking exercise, stress, and depression. People come from different genetic combinations, which mean that some of them might be overweight naturally (Herring et al., 2012). This is evident from when an individual is born and a visit to the pediatrician clinic revealed some of these claims. Some of the children brought in for check-ups were overweight since it ran in their family. However, the doctor in charge advised them on what meals they could feed their children to avoid having more challenges as they grew up. Unhealthy eating also contributes to overweight and obesity issues. Most foods in the market and eating joints stock foods high in calories and cholesterol. In addition, some of these people eat junk most of the time, like when watching television (Frieden, Dietz & Collins, 2010). This is from the fitness adviser at the gym. The environment where one grows, stays, and interacts with affect their overweight and obesity conditions. Some people tend to have an emotional eating spree when going through a stressful and depressing moment in their lives.

Evidence-Based Practice

The most applicable evidence-based practice for the community in Bakersfield is integrating education programs for the community. It should be affordable to most people so that they can gather at designated areas to learn about preparing healthy meals at affordable prices. In addition, public healthcare facilities should avail programs of wellness so that people can come it and learn free of charge (Thangaratinam et al., 2012). This will help in the decision-making processes of persons, as they understand how to live healthy lives with low incomes.

Identification of data

Healthcare facilities in Bakersfield are large in number and are about 3 per square kilometer. The feeder roads are functional and it is therefore easy for people to move from one place to another. Further, the large populations in Bakersfield will provide the numbers needed to educate the people at large.

Social media campaign objective

The main objective of using social media is to enable the nurses reach a wider audience. The campaign targets to reach a population of about around 4000 people dealing with obesity in Bakersfield by the end of the campaign, with an aim of reducing obesity rates by 40 percent by the end of 2018 . Most young people use social media as the main method of communication and access important information related to their welfare (Frieden, Dietz & Collins, 2010). They also trust the sources as opposed to conventional methods according to Briones, Kuch, Liu & Jin (2011). Briones et al. (2011) further describes that is it makes it possible to engage with people at all times, irrespective of the time they access a post on weight and obesity.

Social marketing interventions

These social media interventions include using facebook, twitter instagram pages to hold online discusions aimed at helping people lose weight. The discussion topics will be posted by the social media managers and followers will share ideas and information concerning weight loss and its prevention. Through the pages, followers will also be able to utilize established social media tools provided to local partners by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and fresh social media tools and platforms specific to my target population in Bakersfield. The first social media intervention will specifically aim at healthy nutrition. The second intervention will specifically address increasing daily physical activities. Followers will also pose question and seek clarification on overweight and obesity matters. Responses from nurses will be posted to be seen by all who might have similar questions. Moreover

Rationale

The rationale for using social media as the main method to campaign against issues of overweight and obesity is because most people look for online information on how to control current issues facing them. Moreover social media is known for its ability to influence human behavior Briones et al. (2011) . through maximization of social media influence on many masses, people follow the social media campaigns as well as adopting healthy behaviors for weight loss and prevention of weight gain. They will also trust information disseminated thus incorporating the information to lose weight will be easy.

Social media platforms

Some of the media platforms to use include Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram which are some of the most used applications by youths.

Benefits of social media platform

• Reach a wide audience at the same time thus ensuring that people affected by obesity can have access to useful information that can help them to lose weight the healthy way.
• One-on-one interaction with friends and followers; this will ensure that people affected by obesity can develop meaningful support systems online with people going through similar weight challenges.
• Ability to respond to more than one question at a time of the social media ensures that users and followers in general will get to ask as many questions as possible. This will help them even demystify myths surrounding weight gain as they will be learning from experts.
• Sharing of ideas with other members will be made possible through the interactions as people can learn from success stories of people who have been suffering from excessive weight gain. People can also pick up practices that can work for them.

Benefit of target population

The target population is young people. Teaching youths how to eat healthy and look after their weight from an early age will help develop a positive culture among the community. They will also be in a position to teach their parents and guardians on how to check their weight and avoid issues when they grow older (Hesketh & Campbell, 2010). This culture will also guide them even as they age and will have no issues with weight or obesity.

Best practices for social media

The social media manager should be active and online most of the time so that they can answer questions and issues raised by members as they seek guidance and clarification on different types of foods. This will help increase confidence the people have on social media in addressing their issues (Frieden, Dietz, & Collins, 2010). Another good practice for social media is ensuring that the manager uses polite and professional language when discussing different ideas about weight and obesity and handle followers well so that they can continue with their allegiance to the page.

Stakeholder roles and responsibilities

Every member of the community has a role to play in matters related to their health. They must take the first initiative of eating healthy (Hesketh & Campbell, 2010). They must also be willing and able to follow guidelines forwarded to them so that they can reach the ideal weight depending on their age and gender. It will also be possible to work together in teams, though social media platforms as long as they can access the internet.

Potential partnerships

Partnering with the telecommunications industry in the town of Bakersfield will enable the message of healthy living reach a wider audience. For instance, televisions, social platforms, and print media are very effective when reaching the people living in that community.

Implementation timeline

The implementation timeline will be three months. The first one week will be dedicated to developing topics that will form online discussions on overweight and obesity prevention. This task will be carried out by the manager of the social media pages. After that task is complete the page manager will post a different topic every two days to allow for discussions with followers to fall through for the three months this campaign will run.

Evaluation of effectiveness

Evaluation of the effectiveness of measures taken by the society will depend on the number of people following the social media pages and those that attest they have lost weight and adopted healthy living. The reduced health issues reported at healthcare facilities will also be evidence that people worked on maintaining their weight (Thangaratinam et al., 2012).

Measurable tools

Measurable tools include number of overweight cases per square kilometer, registers made at fitness programs, and healthy children at pediatrician clinics.

Cost of implementation.

Cost of implementing of ideas is cheap; and will use around $500,000. This includes sponsoring the social media page, advertisements on other forms of media, and medical camps to educate the public.

Reflection on Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing will remain effective as long as the management of the page is realistic and works at all times. Further, the ability to introduce new ideas and healthy meals within a budget will encourage more people to have an interest in managing their weight.

Reflection of future nursing practice

Healthcare practitioners have the responsibility of passing advice to their patients on how they can live healthy lives through management of their weight. This can start as early as when parents and guardians take their young ones to pediatrician clinics. It is also the responsibility of nurses to follow up with the patients on how they manage their health conditions.