A school-based intervention to teach 3-4 grades children about healthy heart; the Persian Gulf healthy heart project.
BACKGROUND
Cardiovascular health promotion in children has the potential to reduce the risk of atherosclerosis in both the individual child and the population at large. It thus seems eminently reasonable to initiate healthful lifestyle training in childhood to promote improved cardiovascular health in adult life.


OBJECTIVE
To test the hypothesis that a year long, classroom-based education for the third and fourth graders could change their knowledge scores about healthy heart.


METHODS
A randomized, controlled trial in elementary schools of Bushehr/Iran.


METHODS
A total of 14 elementary schools, categorized by socioeconomic types and male and female setting were selected and randomized into control or intervention groups. Subjects were 1128 third and fourth graders, aged 9 to 10 years (49.1% boys and 50.9% girls). Over a course of 8 weeks, health educators and sport teachers of the elementary schools presented two hours sessions per week on heart function, nutrition, and exercise for healthy heart and living tobacco free for the intervention group. The education program was based on HeartPower! Program, an American Heart Association program.


METHODS
Mann-Whitney U test and Wilcoxon matched-pairs signed rank test and Bonferroni correction for the two pair wise comparisons were used.


RESULTS
Total heart knowledge at posttest was 25% correct higher in the intervention than in the control group (p< 0.001). Difference in means of total healthy heart knowledge scores between control and intervention group increased from 1.43 points in baseline to 4.02 points in posttest (p< 0.001).


CONCLUSIONS
It can be concluded that the classroom-based cardiovascular health promotion had a significant effect on the heart healthy knowledge. Therefore, schools provide an excellent setting for introducing comprehensive healthy heart education and promotion of cardiovascular health to the general population.
Nabipour
Iraj
I
Persian Gulf Health Research Center, Bushehr University of Medical Science, Bushehr, I.R, Iran. nabipour@bpums.ac.ir
Imami
Syed Reza
SR
Mohammadi
Mohammad Mehdi
MM
Heidari
Gholamreza
G
Bahramian
Fatemeh
F
Azizi
Fatemeh
F
Khosravizadegan
Zahra
Z
Pazoki
Raha
R
Soltanian
Ali-Reza
AR
Ramazanzadeh
Mahbobeh
M
Emadi
Abdolresoul
A
Arab
Jahfar
J
Larijani
Bagher
B
D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000517:prevention & control*; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006266:Health Education; D006293:Health Promotion; D006801:Humans; D007492:Iran; D008297:Male; D012574:Schools