Health Promotion Lifestyle Profile of Low-Income African American Women During Interconception

Abstract

African American women are the most at risk population for poor perinatal birth outcomes in United States. To eliminate these ethnic and racial perinatal disparities, The United States Department of Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) adopted the Life Course Perspective conceptual framework (Fine & Kotelchuck, 2010). The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) implemented these life course preconception care interventions and policies to improve birth outcomes and maternal health and well-being across women’s, especially poor women’s, lifespans (Lu & Halfron, 2003). Pender’s revised Health Promotion Model supports the framework by adding a nursing explanation of how an individual can improve their own health promoting lifestyles (Gillis, 1993). In particular, the nursing model has an accompanying tool titled the Health Promotion Lifestyle Profiles II (Walker, Sechrist, & Pender, 1995) that measures an individual’s characteristics and health promotion behaviors. Therefore, the aim of this study is to utilize the Health Promotion Model and Health Promotion Lifestyle Profiles II to examine the health-promoting behaviors of low-income African American women of reproductive age during the interconception period to better understand and ultimately improve poor women’s perinatal birth outcomes. Objectives: The aim of this study is to utilize the Health Promotion Model and Health Promotion Lifestyle Profiles II to examine the health-promoting behaviors of low-income African American women of reproductive age during the interconception period. Patients and Methods: This descriptive quantitative pilot study was carried out on a sample of 52 women of child bearing (18 - 44 years of age) in WIC offices in three low-income locations in the city of Philadelphia. The participants were a convenience sample. The scale for health 10 promotion lifestyle was Walker’s Health Promoting lifestyle Profile (HPLP II), which encompasses six healthy lifestyle dimensions. Results: The data collection tools used in the study was 1.Maternal Demographic Information Sheet, 2. Interconception Individual Characteristics and Experiences Questionnaire and 3. Health Promoting Lifestyle Profile II (HPLP II). The results obtained from the study showed that total HPLP II scores indicated that survey participants ‘sometimes’ to ‘often’ engaged in health promoting behaviors. The highest scores were obtained on the spiritual growth dimension and the lowest scores on the physical activity dimension.%%%%D.N.P., Nursing Practice – Drexel University, 2017