Clinician Role-Play Simulation to Reduce the Occurrence of Childhood Obesity

描述(申请人提供)：肥胖症在美国处于历史高位，是一个重要的健康问题(FLegal等人，2010年)。尽管这一担忧影响着所有年龄段的人，但在过去的25年里，儿童肥胖症的案例增加了两倍。超重和肥胖的儿童不仅会经历与健康相关的问题，而且从心理上来说，他们的自尊心也会下降(Wang等人，2009年)。儿童肥胖对终生健康的影响更有可能在更小的年龄就开始，而且比晚年变得肥胖的人面临的影响更严重(Franks等人，2010年)。针对儿童的肥胖治疗干预措施已被证明比针对成人的干预措施更有效(Epstein等人，1998年)，然而，卫生保健提供者在他们的实践中并没有常规地解决肥胖预防和治疗问题。为了针对这一治疗差距，SIMmersion与富尔克森博士和舍伍德博士一起，提议开发一个原型模拟，以培训医疗保健提供者有效地与父母进行讨论，为儿童肥胖症提供干预并降低进展的可能性。拟议的培训模拟系统将允许卫生保健提供者练习与超重儿童的父母交谈，以便练习在不惊慌的情况下传达关切，准备和处理阻力，并确定适当的资源、动机和变革步骤。为了评估使用交互式多媒体模拟来培训卫生保健提供者以教育和激励父母做出改变的可行性，将要求两组在儿童肥胖症预防和治疗方面具有专业知识的卫生保健提供者审查原型模拟并提供反馈。在第一阶段成功完成后，将建立一个扩展的、功能齐全的模拟，并在第二阶段使用随机对照试验评估疗效。模拟患者计划预计将提高我们培训肥胖治疗和预防方面的医疗专业人员的能力。我们预计，培训系统将使卫生保健提供者更好地为教育他们的患者和患者家属做好准备，从而改变超重和肥胖儿童和青少年及其家人的生活方式。 公共卫生相关性：创新和经济的技术，帮助初级保健医生获得与父母进行讨论的能力，为儿童肥胖症提供干预并减少进展的可能性。教育和激励父母改变超重和肥胖儿童的家庭环境将减少儿童肥胖的情况及其对健康和生活质量的长期影响。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Obesity in the United States is at historically high levels and is an important health problem (Flegal et al., 2010). While the concern affects all age groups, the instances of childhood obesity have tripled within the last twenty-five years. Not only do overweight and obese children experience health-related concerns, psychosocially they have been shown to experience decreased self-esteem (Wang et al., 2009). The lifetime health effects of obesity in children are more likely to start at an earlier age and be more severe than those faced by individuals who become obese later in life (Franks et al., 2010). Obesity treatment interventions targeted toward children have been shown to be more effective than those for adults (Epstein et al., 1998), and yet, health care providers do not routinely address obesity prevention and treatment in their practices. To target this gap in treatment, SIMmersion, together with Dr. Fulkerson and Dr. Sherwood, proposes to develop a prototype simulation to train health care providers to effectively conduct discussions with parents to provide intervention for and reduce the likelihood of progression to childhood obesity. The proposed training simulation system will allow health care providers to practice talking to the parent of an overweight child in order to practice communicating concern without alarm, preparing for and dealing with resistance, and identifying appropriate resources, motivations, and steps for change. To evaluate the feasibility of using an interactive, multi-media simulation to train health care providers to educate and motivate parents to make changes, two groups of health care providers with expertise in childhood obesity prevention and treatment will be asked to review the prototype simulation and provide feedback. Upon successful completion of Phase I, an expanded, full-featured simulation will be built and evaluated for efficacy using a randomized control trial during Phase II. The simulated patient program is expected to advance our ability to train medical professionals in obesity treatment and prevention. We anticipate that the training system will better prepare health care providers to educate their patients and the patients' families, resulting in lifestyle changes among overweight and obese children and adolescents and their families. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Innovative and economical technologies that assist primary care physicians in acquiring competence in conducting discussions with parents to provide intervention for and reduce the likelihood of progression to childhood obesity. Educating and motivating parents to change family environments for overweight and obese children will reduce the instances of childhood obesity and the long-term impact it has on health and quality of life.