Effects of a Fitness and Healthy Nutrition Promotion After-School Program in Urban African Americans

Abstract

1028 PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of a 12-week afterschool pilot program entitled “SPAI'N” (Students and Parents Actively Involved In Being Fit) to promote health-related fitness and nutrition in urban African Americans. METHODS: The SPAI'N after-school educational program was offered for 12 weeks (4 days/week, 60–75 min/session) to students and their parents/guardians at an urban middle school. The aims of the intervention were to improve participants' health fitness status through supervised dance and exercise activities, and to increase their vegetable and fruit consumption by utilizing existing educational resource materials/activities from the “5 A Day For Better Health” national nutrition program. Fifty-six children and 25 parents/guardians completed the following evaluations before and after the administration of the program: weight, height, body fat (Omron bioelectrical impedance analyzer), resting arterial blood pressure (indirect auscultation), endurance walk/run, and behavioral changes regarding vegetable and fruit intakes from commonly used food frequency research questionnaires. RESULTS: Pre-post pairwise t-tests revealed that both children and parents/guardians showed an increase in fruit consumption and a reduction in diastolic blood pressure (p < .0.5). In addition, the parents/guardians showed a decrease in body fat, BMI and endurance walk/run time (p < .0.5) while the children did not. Alternately, the children showed improvements in fruit juice, salad and non-fried potato consumption (p < 0.05) while the parents/guardians did not. CONCLUSIONS: This preliminary study suggests that the SPAI'N after-school education initiative can benefit both children and their parents/guardians, but the benefits are not necessarily the same. Parents/guardians tended to derive more fitness related benefits while their children tended to gain more diet related benefits. However, both groups showed improvements in resting blood pressure, which is important in this urban African American population. Supported by Aramark Service Master/Aramark Gourmet