School-Based Exercise and Life Style Motivation Intervention (SEAL.MI) on Adolescent's Cardiovascular Risk Factors and Academic Performance: Catch Them Young.

Premalatha Paulsamy,Ester Mary Pappiya,Vigneshwaran Easwaran,Rajalakshimi Vasudevan,Kumarappan Chidambaram,Absar Ahmed Qureshi,Geetha Kandasamy,Pranave Sethuraj,Kousalya Prabahar,Vani Manoharan,Krishnaraju Venkatesan,Noohu Abdulla Khan,Kalaiselvi Periannan,Kumar Venkatesan

doi:10.3390/healthcare9111549

Abstract

There are shreds of evidence of shared biological mechanisms between obesity and hypertension during childhood intoadulthood, and loads of research literature has proven that it will profoundly cost nations’ economies and health if neglected. The prevention and early diagnosis of cardiovascular risk factors such as overweight and hypertension is an essential strategy for control, effective treatment and prevention of its’ complications. The study aims to assess the effect of school-based Exercise and Lifestyle Motivation Intervention (SEAL-MI) on adolescents’ cardiovascular risk factors and academic performance. An experimental study was conducted among 1005 adolescents—520 and 485 were randomly selected for the control and study groups, respectively.A structured interview questionnaire was used to collect demographic details and data related to dietary habits, physical activity, sleep qualityand academic performance. The study group adolescents were given the SEAL-MI for six months, including a school-based rope exercise for 45 min per day for 5 days a week and a motivation intervention related to dietary habits, physical activity, and sleep. Post tests-1 and 2 were done after 3 and 6 months of intervention.The prevalence of overweight among adolescents was 28.73%, and prehypertension was 9.26%. Among overweight adolescents, the prevalence of prehypertension was found to be very high (32.25%). There was a significant weight reduction in post-intervention B.P. (p = 0.000) and improvement in dietary habits, physical activity, sleep (p = 0.000), and academic performance. A significant positive correlation was found between BMI and SBP (p = 0.000) and BMI and academic performance (p = 0.003). The linear regression analyses revealed that the gender (ß: 0.47, 95% CI: 0.39, 0.81), age (ß: 0.39, 95% CI: 0.17, 0.46), family income (ß: 0.2, 95% CI: 0.41, 0.5), residence (ß: 0.19, 95% CI: 0.01, 0.27), and type of family (ß: 0.25, 95% CI: 0.39, 0.02) had the strongest correlation with the BMI of the adolescents. Additionally, Mother’s education (ß: 0.35, 95% CI: 0.18, 0.59) had the strongest correlation with the SBP of the adolescents. In contrast, the DBP was negatively persuaded by age (ß: −0.36, 95% CI: 1.54, 0.29) and gender (ß: −0.26, 95% CI: 1.34, 0.12) of the adolescents. Regular practice of rope exercise and lifestyle modification such as diet, physical activity, and quality sleep among adolescents prevent and control childhood CVD risk factors such asoverweight and hypertension. The SEAL-MI may lead to age-appropriate development of adolescents as well as improve their academic performance and quality of life. Giving importance to adolescents from urban habitats, affluent, nuclear families, and catching them young will change the disease burden significantly.

Highlights

The world of tomorrow will inherit the adolescents of today
From the 16 selected schools from each urban and rural area, all the adolescents aged 13–14 years, who were willing to participate in the study, were screened for hypertension and overweight as a first phase (Figure 1)
Among the 1195 overweight and prehypertension, 1005 adolescents and their parents who were willing to participate in the study were selected randomly for the intervention (520) and control (485) group by lottery method

Summary

Introduction

Developing the full potential of adolescents and helping them to survive with good health is essential. Due to the constant development of economic level and corresponding lifestyle changes, we are facing a gradual increase in weight with the younger-age trend. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), childhood obesity has been strongly associated with a higher chance of premature death and disability in adulthood [2,3]. Central adiposity, defined as fat mass accumulation around the abdomen, is highly correlated with cardiovascular risks such as hypertension, elevated plasma lipid concentrations, lipoprotein concentrations, C-reactive protein(CRP)levels, insulin resistance (I.R.) [3], and changes within the vasculature such as increased arterial stiffness [4] and blood pressure (B.P.) [5] in children and adolescents [6]

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