A5056 - Creating An Innovative Staff Training Program to Meet Mbsaqip Standards for Adolescents on A General Care Pediatric Floor

Abstract

Childhood overweight and obesity affect approximately 1/3 of US children. Many have one or more comorbidities such as abnormal blood pressure, dyslipidemia, non alcoholic fatty liver disease, metabolic syndrome, polycystic ovarian syndrome, pre-diabetes, diabetes, obstructive sleep apnea, psychological problems, impaired quality of life, as well as others. Treatment of childhood obesity can be time consuming, difficult and complex and many pediatric practices have limited resources to offer interventions within an office setting. To provide guidance in the primary care settting Spear and others, created evidenced-based recommendations for obesity treatment and described it as a step or staged approach for weight management. It provides a practical way to address childhood obesity and the staged care is divided into four stages including prevention plus utilizing healthy lifestyle changes, structured weight management, comprehensive multidisciplinary intervention and tertiary care intervention. Our Adolescent Weight Loss Surgery Program is a part of a comprehensive multidisciplinary intervention program through the Healthy Lifestyles Center where the pediatric surgery team evaluates adolescents for surgery during the tertiary care intervention phase. With the new Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery Accreditation and Quality Improvement Program, (MBSAQIP)Standards, only the centers who have achieved this designation may perform bariatric operations. While the Virginia Commonwealth University Health System has been a pioneer in adult bariatric surgery, we only recently received our accreditation as a Comprenhensive Center with Adolescent Qualifications. In order to qualify and maintain accreditation, specific educational training is required for all staff who care for this population.