Nursing Research (Due 24 hours)

Background of the study

According to the authors of the first article “Healthy eating, activity and obesity prevention. a qualitative study of parent and child perceptions in Australia”, obesity and overweight are steeply increasing in Australia. The article further states that almost 25 percent of children are affected by this issue, thus posing a significant challenge in developing population-based, effective, and contemporary management strategies (Hesketh et al. 2005). The qualitative view was conducted to elicit parents' and children's views on environmental and social barriers to physical activity, healthy eating, and obesity prevention program. The study's objective was to develop an effective obesity intervention strategy that focuses not only on the consumption of energy-dense foods and physical inactivity (Hesketh et al. 2005). The information presented in this article is essential in nursing. It provides facts on the effectiveness of physical activity and healthy eating in obesity management and factors that may hinder managing obesity through these two major measures. The research used a series of questions based on the activity and healthy eating of participants.

The second article “Obesity treatment*more than food and exercise: a qualitative study exploring obese adolescents’ and their parents’ viewson the former’s obesity” also focused on the management of obesity. The article highlight two Common treatment for obesity and overweight, which include healthy eating and frequent exercise. Healthy eating habits reduce the amount of calories (Lindelof et al., 2010). On the other hand, physical exercises increase individuals' energy expenditure, which helps them balance body energy and even lose weight. Physical exercise also decreases body fats hence reducing the rate of abdominal obesity development. According to the authors, these two main factors may help some individuals lose weight and minimize the chances of regaining the already lost weight (Lindelof et al. 2010). However, Some obese individuals are unable to lose weight and maintain their status through these two practices. Therefore, this article aimed to examine the obese adolescents and their parents' view on the former obesity; primarily to acquire knowledge on motivational factors and barriers that obese adolescents' ability to lose their weight. Information and findings stated in this article are essential in nursing; they provide information essential in managing obesity conditions of patients who do not respond to dietary change and physical exercise.

How two articles support the nurse practice issue

Glycemic control is a key factor in the treatment of patients with diabetes mellitus. Key major activities in establishing glycemic control are healthy dietary patterns and physical exercise. The two articles are focused on these two factors and which form the PICOT question's primary focus. These articles and findings provided, therefore, are associated with numerous conditions that influence the existence of this problem. They offer information that supports the effectiveness of healthy eating and exercise in establishing glycemic control, which remains a challenge to many diabetic adults. Just as in the case of adolescents, adult obese people faced numerous challenges in reducing their weight. They require proper and practical strategies to reduce unhealthy food intake when alone or in their families (Hesketh et al. 2005). In terms of exercise, it is essential to use the information provided in this research to acknowledge that they cannot have a formalized exercise. Instead, they should focus on non-formalized activities such as walking and cycling (Lindelof et al., 2010). Many individuals in this population are engaged in family and work duties and may have challenged finding time to engage in formalized physical activities.

Method of Study:

Previously conducted research shows that overweight prevalence appears to be unequally distributed between people of different population groups. In the first article, Water and William used a qualitative method to families from various social circumstances (Hesketh et al. 2005). The researchers selected three demographically diverse primary schools and administered questions to parents and children to examine the effectiveness of healthy eating and exercise in obesity management. This study's qualitative approach helps capture changing attitudes within obese children and their parents (Hesketh et al. 2005). The method used also has its disadvantages because it may require multiple sessions to capture the required data.

Views as an outcome of the research are difficult to quantify and too unknown at the beginning of the research conducted through a quantitative approach that uses different kinds of interviews and field observation (Lindelof et al. 2010). Researchers in the second article opted for the scientific framework. Therefore, the research utilized a phenomenological hermeneutic approach, inspired by Paul Ricoeur's theory of interpretation, a French philosopher, and used several qualitative explorations. This method's significant advantage is that it provides a much more flexible approach and helps put the study results in a meaningful context (Lindelof et al. 2010). However, this method has its challenge; the findings arrived at through this method cannot be extended to a larger population.

Results of Study

The first article shows that the awareness of the importance of healthiness and physical exercise was high to both parents and children (Hesketh et al. 2005). However, the perception of these individuals on the healthiness of some sedentary activities was uncertain. The contradiction of the message children receive was shown to be the highest barrier to healthy eating. The results also show that most children easily identified physical activity as essential for health and discussed its advantages, including fat reduction and fitness. Therefore, the researchers concluded that Implicit messages and contradictions in the explicit around physical exercise and diet need to be prevented from managing obesity easily (Hesketh et al. 2005).

The second article's findings show that obese adolescents have explicit knowledge that their eating habits are willing to change this situation. Though these young people have a poor physical shape, they view their exercise level as moderate (Lindelof et al. 2010). The findings state that these adolescents blame themselves for being obese. They also blame their parents for being unsupportive in terms of exercise and providing them with unhealthy diets. This research also states that parents blame these children for lack of willingness to change exercise and eating habits (Lindelof et al. 2010). These create negative feelings, which makes it hard for these adolescents to deal with obesity.

The two articles are essential in nursing practice; they provide a clear guideline for managing obesity through weight loss and preventing patients from regaining the already lost weight. The articles also provide a list of factors that hinder community members from achieving their goal of losing weight. The information and findings provided in this article can help develop proper strategies that one can use to lose weight and save individuals from health issues associated with obesity. Obesity is a complex health issue that results from a combination of individual factors such as behavior and other causes. These articles provide nurses with the necessary information to provide patients education, which is critical in dealing with obesity. This will reduce the intensity of diseases related to obesity, such as heart diseases, diabetes, and cancer.

Ethical Considerations

One of the significant ethical considerations when conducting research is respect for privacy. The privacy of research participants is a crucial factor in research ethics. The research consideration insists that individuals in human subject research have the right to privacy when participating in the research (Roberts et al., 2019). Confidentiality in research is upheld to protect all research participants' privacy and build rapport and trust. It is also essential in maintaining the integrity of the research process and ethical process. The issue of data confidentiality is first addressed at first-time data collection (Clark-Kazak, 2019).

The second ethical consideration is Informed consent. When conducting, it is necessary to obtain informed consent. This is a procedure through which a participant voluntarily decided to participate in research after reading and understanding all research-related information (Clark-Kazak, 2019). This consideration is vital in health-related research because it offers all the potential participants information they need to understand before volunteering to participate in research. Without informed consent, participants may have little or no information on what they are participating in (Roberts et al., 2019).

In respect to privacy ethical consideration, researchers in both articles published restricted information that cannot be used to identify participants. There is no single information in these publications which can be used to suspect participants of the research. This is evident in the manner in which research results are presented in both articles. Based on the information shared on how the research was conducted, researchers gave participants adequate information concerning the study and obtaining voluntary agreement. This granted participants an opportunity to decide if they are willing to participate.

References

Hesketh, K., Waters, E., Green, J., Salmon, L., & Williams, J. (2005). Healthy eating, activity, and obesity prevention: a qualitative study of parent and child perceptions in Australia. Health promotion international, 20(1), 19-26.

Lindelof, A., Nielsen, C. V., & Pedersen, B. (2010). Obesity treatment—more than food and exercise: a qualitative study exploring obese adolescents' and their parents' views on the former's obesity. International journal of qualitative studies on health and well-being, 5(2), 5073.

Roberts, L. W., Berk, M. S., & Lane-McKinley, K. (2019). Ethical considerations in research on suicide prediction: necessity as the mother of invention. Jama Psychiatry, 76(9), 883-884.

Clark-Kazak, C. (2019). Developing ethical guidelines for research. Forced Migration Review, (61), 12-13.