Group mixes prevention with faith to fight diabetes
Pulse editor
Sunday, August 24, 2008
How do you address a huge community problem? You get the community involved in the solution, says Dr. Sunita Dodani, Ph.D., MSc, FCPS, FAHA, assistant dean for research at the Medical College of Georgia School of Nursing in Augusta.
“African-Americans are at a disproportionately high risk for Type 2 diabetes, due to higher prevalence of obesity and less physical activity,” Dodani said. “Every third African-American man and woman over 40 will be diagnosed with the disease.”
PHIL JONES / Special
Dr. Sunita Dodani, assistant dean of research at the Medical College of Georgia School of Nursing, led the effort to create Fit, Body & Soul.
PAULA HINELY / Special
Participants join hands in prayer at a Fit Body & Soul program. The Medical College of Georgia School of Nursing and Gospel Water Branch Baptist Church were partners in the pilot study of the diabetes prevention effort, which promotes behavioral lifestyle change through weight loss, exercise and nutrition in African-American churches.
Research funded by the National Institutes of Health has shown that proper diet and exercise can reduce the onset of Type 2 diabetes by about 60 percent. The challenge is getting people to make those lifestyle changes and to stick with them.
Dodani and a group of Medical College of Georgia researchers have partnered with African-American churches to design a faith-based prevention program.
Dodani wanted the effort to reach the community as a whole.
“For the community to feel like it was theirs, for them to own it, the program couldn’t just be a clinic-based program that addressed high-risk patients,” she said.
During a daylong workshop, Dodani, diabetes experts and six local ministers created the program and named it Fit, Body & Soul. The 12-week curriculum is based on the National Institutes of Health-funded diabetes prevention program and Body & Soul, a faith-based program that encourages participants to eat more fruits and vegetables.
Fit, Body & Soul includes health-based guidelines for nutrition and exercise, as well as biblical passages that pertain specifically to each week’s theme.
The program is designed to be led by church leaders who have been trained as health advisers or peer lifestyle coaches, advertised in church newsletters and supported from the pulpit.
“Based on previous research, African-Americans in this community prefer a collective approach, so establishing church, group and individual goals will be a strong motivating factor,” Dodoni said.
The curriculum provides goals for the church congregation, behavioral lifestyle groups and individual participants.
From January through March, Dodani piloted the program at Gospel Water Branch Baptist Church in Evans. The 40 participants met weekly in small groups and were encouraged to motivate each other. Collectively, they lost 882 pounds.
“Fifty percent of the participants lost at least five percent of their baseline weight through diet and exercise,” Dodani said. “Another 25 percent lost at least 7 percent.”
In October, researchers will follow up to see if the group has continued their lifestyle changes.
“This has worked better for me than any diet, because it’s based on Christ,” said Sandra L. Dunn, who has lost 34 pounds. “I repeated our mantra, ‘I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me,’ several times a day and I always prayed before I worked out.”
Lavoria Williams, a nurse practitioner and a nursing doctoral student, worked on the project. As a nurse researcher, Williams was interested in the final numbers, but said that the most meaningful part of the program was “hearing the participants’ testimonies about how their health is improving and actually seeing how the program has impacted their lives.” People talked about being thinner, reducing their cholesterol, having more stamina and feeling better.
Dodoni designed the program to be replicated.
“The goal is for it to spread from church to church, with the leaders from one church training another,” she said.
Dodoni has applied for a $3 million National Institutes of Health grant to spread the program to 20 more churches.
“The official word hasn’t come through yet, but our representative told us to prepare to celebrate,” she said. “We’re expecting to grow this program much faster than we thought.”
Dodoni recently presented her findings to the International Society on Hypertension in Blacks and received the group’s 2008 Community Service Award.
“I believe this is the kind of program that will make an impact,” she said. “After the 20-church study, we can reduce diabetes in the African-American community.”