Graduate Student Internship Program

2009 Catalog of Internship Opportunities

Needs Assessment of Childhood Obesity Prevention in Oregon

Oregon Public Health Division, Office of Family Health, Portland, OR
Skill Area: Needs Assessment

Agency Information

The Office of Family Health is Oregon’s Title V agency. It includes programs on Perinatal, Child, and Adolescent Health, School Health, Family Planning, Immunization, Oral Health and WIC.

Purpose, goals, and objectives of internship

Purpose: To address childhood obesity in Oregon, analyze new data on risk factors for obesity in 2-year-olds in order to inform a statewide comprehensive obesity prevention program.

Goals: To identify weight status of 2-year-olds and associated risk factors for development of obesity.

Objectives: (1) Identify nutrition-related risk factors (consumption of fruits and vegetables, junk food, beverage patterns, meals away from home, family means, food insecurity). (2) Identify feeding-related risk factors (mother’s perception of child eating, perception of child’s weight and actual weight, mother’s weight and perception of weight). (3) Identify activity-related risk factors (physical activity of mother, screen time behaviors). (4) Ration of breastfeeding as a protective factor
Identify familial and child health risk factors (diabetes, asthma) and health status perception. (5) Identify sociodemographic factors.

Data or analytic tasks and activities

1. Oregon will be doing a Needs Assessment around prevention of childhood obesity. This will mean exploring childhood behaviors around nutrition and physical activity. It appears that habits from early childhood are important contributors to healthy eating and physical activity. We have new data on early childhood nutrition and physical activity that can be incorporated into the Needs Assessment on prevention of childhood obesity.
2. Oregon PRAMS is a survey of postpartum women. We recently began re-interviewing PRAMS respondents when their baby is two years old, creating a longitudinal study (called PRAMS-2). The first data from PRAMS-2 is now available and includes many questions about the eating habits of the two year olds. Many of the questions may be related to childhood obesity. The intern will analyze PRAMS-2 data on the eating habits of two year olds.
3. Preliminary analysis of Oregon PRAMS data shows that 24.7% of the children ate french fries 2+ days/week; 20.6% of 2-year olds drank soda 2+ days/week; and 21.0% of 2-year olds watched TV or videos 2+ hours/day. The intern will look at these and other possible risk factors for childhood obesity to identify which children are at the greatest risk for childhood obesity.
4. The intern will review the literature on 1) the link between early childhood nutrition/activity and later childhood obesity, and 2) interventions that have shown promise in improving early childhood nutrition/activity. The intern will write up findings and summarize data for state and local health department program staff. Depending on the findings, perhaps prepare findings for presentation at national meetings and/or publication.

Data or analytic skills required

Some experience using SPSS or SAS is required.

Supervisors

Primary: Dr. Ken Rosenberg, MD, MPH, Maternal and Child Health Epidemiologist in the Office of Family Health.

Internship begins

Any time from February to July 2009.

Housing

Assistance in locating and securing housing will be available. Housing near the worksite is plentiful and inexpensive. Previous GSIP interns have found housing in private homes by responding to advertisements in the local daily newspaper.

Transportation

The worksite is easily accessible via public transportation from many neighborhoods.

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