Abstract

Childhood obesity is a growing epidemic in the United States that has short-term and long-term health consequences for the children affected. Nurses are patient advocates and are responsible for speaking up for the patient; in the pediatric population, a nurse must act as an advocate on behalf of the child. The purpose of this literature review is to look at different barriers to nursing interventions in regard to childhood obesity. A literature review was done by using different databases, with 11 articles having similar themes and interventions used. The main themes from the literature review were parental willingness and involvement in weight loss strategies with their child, a lack of training for nurses in the area of childhood obesity, and a lack of standardized assessment methods for charting and tracking children's weight status. The research suggests that the more involved a parent is, the more successful the child's weight loss will be. Additionally, an overall lack of training in health promotion was noted among nurses alone with a feeling of discomfort when speaking to parents and children about the child's weight, indicating a need for further education in health promotion techniques. Finally, articles did not commonly use a standardized assessment method to track weight status in the pediatric population, making cross-examination of different result difficult and points to a need for a standardized measure that is as objective as possible, such as a body fat percentage measure.

Thesis Completion

2019

Semester

Spring

Thesis Chair/Advisor

Decker, Jonathan

Degree

Bachelor of Science in Nursing (B.S.N.)

College

College of Nursing

Language

English

Access Status

Open Access

Release Date

5-1-2019

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