Development of a Medical Center Kiosk to Promote Pediatric Obesity Risk Reduction

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To assist with pediatric obesity risk reduction, pediatricians have partnered with the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP). Parents are referred by pediatricians to receive nutrition education in the medical clinic site provided by EFNEP. Development of an education kiosk to be placed in the clinic waiting room to facilitate pediatric obesity risk communication between parents of pediatric patients and pediatricians and increase referrals to the EFNEP intervention. Select kiosk content. Conduct formal planning meetings with researchers, medical clinic and IT (Information Technology) staff to determine type of kiosk plus location and content output (directly to patient or via medical record). Design and code kiosk program based on content selected and medical staff priorities. Content of kiosk was based on previous longitudinal validation results of two pediatric obesity risk assessment tools, Healthy Kids and My Child at Mealtime. Based on three meetings with clinic staff and physicians, and two meetings with IT staff, a small scale, mobile iPad kiosk with attached receipt style printer and location in the clinic were determined. The kiosk programming generated tailored pediatric obesity prevention messages based on a 21-item survey. The tailored printout encourages the parent to discuss messages with their pediatrician and the EFNEP intervention offered at the clinic. Development of a medical center kiosk to facilitate pediatric obesity risk reduction requires collaboration between content experts, clinic staff, IT personal, design and programming experts. Printing nutrition messages via iPad kiosk proved challenging due to medical center Wi-Fi connectivity and security issues. The kiosk will be pilot tested with parents in spring 2017.