Developing a Child Obesity Prevention Program Using a Faith-Based Community Approach - Essay Example

'Developing a Child Obesity Prevention Program Using a Faith-Based Community Approach' is a marvelous example of a paper on child development. 
As people are can often be edgy about research tactics in finding solutions to problems, especially those related to health in minorities, a faith-based community intervention was created. This was done in the place of traditional, more common methods of research and intervention. The purpose of the article is to make aware of other methods of research and intervention when others do not trust normal techniques. The conclusion of this study was that faith-based research can work in aiding children with obesity when the researchers make it clear that they actually want to help the child, and not just use them as a subject.

The overall validity of the article is sound, as people in faith-based communities rely a lot on their faith to help them through health problems. If researchers use this method to help children fight and overcome obesity, the children, as well as their parents, will be more trusting in it. One of the weaknesses was that only minorities were studied in regard to faith-based intervention; some of the majority groups may react differently to faith-based intervention, even if they are in a faith-driven community. One thing I would recommend for improving the article would be to focus on all sorts of groups, ethnically, religiously, and socially, whether or not they are minority or majority.

As aforementioned, the researchers should have looked into all groups, not just minorities. While minorities are the ones who are most edgy about seeking research and intervention in regard to health issues, majorities can also have the same suspicions for the same reasons as minorities. The target population, the minority groups, are a good start for this type of research, though I believe that more can be found if the population is spread out to include more groups of people. The abstract is clear and complete, stating the purpose of the study, the target group, and the methods that were used. The sample group, African Americans in a faith-driven environment, is clearly described, allowing it to be understood as to why they were chosen.

The relevance of the information in the article to community health nursing practices is great in the sense that nurses, as well as others in the medical field, have different options when it comes to research and interventions. Communities are often smaller, close-knit groups that rely on different practices when it comes to understanding and overcoming health problems. Especially when people, such as minorities, do not trust traditional research and intervention methods, nurses can look to these faith-based ideas and concepts similar to help reach out to a specific community. Nurses can take this information and apply it to their own practices in smaller communities, just as long as they are able to identify what draws and keeps that community together.