Appraising Quantitative Research

Article Number

Author and Date

Evidence Type

Sample, Sample size, setting

Findings that help in answering the EBP Questions

Observable Measures

Limitations

Evidence Level, Quality

I

Lidgate, E. D., & Lindenmeyer, A. (2018). A qualitative insight into informal childcare and childhood obesity in children aged 0–5 years in the UK. BMC Public Health, 18, 1229. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-6131-0

Qualitative study.

It involves gathering the data on human behavior to understand why and how the decision are made for example the authors performed the qualitative study with parents as well as informal carers to explore their experience in giving or receiving informal childcare for British children aged 0-5 years; the perceived reasons of the relationship between the informal childcare and the childhood obesity; and the most preferred intervention thoughts as well as the delivery approaches for the prevention of the obesity amongst children under informal care.

The targeted population are the parents and the informal caregivers. About 14 participants i.e. 7 parents and 7 informal caregivers were put through a four in-depth focus groups. The settings were in Birmingham and Edinburgh with 1 parent group and 1 informal caregiver group in each city.

The study is showing that obesity among children is linked to childhood obesity and informal childcare for children of ages 0-5 years.

Education to the informal care is assisting in supporting parents and preventing obesity among children during their care. The study is helping in the generation of the rich insights into the potential components and the strategies that can be used as the future interventions that targets the informal caregivers, parents, and children of ages 0-5 years old. The study is important to the parents, caregivers, and the society as being the practical and the emotional support for the parents and the caregivers.

The observable measures are the reported incidence of the childhood obesity as a result of the implementation of the informal care. The successful implementation of the informal care leads to the support to parents and prevention of obesity among children.

The limitation of the study is associates with few number of the study participants due to the project limited timeframe. This therefore makes it essential to make an interpretation of the data with some limitations.

VI, Moderate

2

Tremblay, M. S., Chaput , J.-P., & Carson, V. (2017). Canadian 24-Hour Movement Guidelines for the Early Years (0–4 years): An Integration of Physical Activity, Sedentary Behaviour, and Sleep. BMC Public Health, 17, 874. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-017-4859-6

Qualitative: a systematic review conducted on the physical activity and health indicators; sedentary behavior and health indicators; sleep and health indicators; and combined movement behaviors and health indicators.

522 Canadian preschool-aged children from the CHMS.

The Canadian 24-hour movement guidelines for early years (0-4 years) is helping in promoting movement behaviors across the whole day thus helping in addressing the issues of the childhood obesity

Increased in the movement behaviors.

Reduction of the potential risk to obesity among children. Improvement in the health of the children of ages 1-4 years.

Existence of incomplete evidence-based for the guidelines with low quality. the study is not representing the best available evidence collected through the systematic review and the original research. The research work is lacking adequate research to form specific aspects of the guidelines for example the dose-response research studies.

I, High

3

Lloyd, J., CStat, C. S., Logan, S., Green, C., Dean, S., Hillsdon , M., Abraham, C., Tomlinson, R., Pearson, V., Taylor, R., Ryan, E., Price, L., Streeter, A., Wyatt, K., & Wyatt, K. (2018). Effectiveness of the Healthy Lifestyles Programme (HeLP) to prevent obesity in UK primary-school children: a cluster randomised controlled trial. The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, 2(1), 35-45. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2352-4642(17)30151-7

Qualitative; targeted at establishing whether a school-based intervention for the children of ages 9-10 years would help in the prevention of the excessive weight gain after 2 years.

Sample calculation assumed a mean of 35 children age 9-10 years in every school and this implies that a total of 1,120 samples were used. The participants were from primary and junior schools in Devon and Plymouth in the United Kingdom.

School hosts many children and are ideal place to deliver the population-based interventions. This is important in addressing the issue of childhood obesity sinnce it helps in promoting healthy behaviors among children.

Improvement in the healthy lifestyles; maintenance of the healthy body mass index; reduction in the obesity cases among children.

The interventions used are highly heterogeneous in the design and most of the studies used for the research have some methodological weaknesses for example the inadequate statistical power, greater levels of attrition, differential uptake, follow-up, and the short-lived follow-up.

II, High