New York Biomedical Research Institutes and Hospitals Team with City Middle Schools to Reduce Childhood Obesity and Diabetes Through Innovative Early Intervention Project

NEW YORK, Feb. 1 /PRNewswire/ -- AMDeC, the Academy for Medical Development and Collaboration, announced today a February kick-off for the fitness/education intervention phase of the fourth study year of the innovative ROAD (Reduce Obesity and Diabetes) project involving an ethnically diverse student population from public middle schools in New York.

Supported by a $5 million grant from The Starr Foundation, the project studies the pathogenesis and prevention of type 2 diabetes in children through lifestyle assessments and school-based intervention consisting of health, nutrition and exercise education.

"Until recently, school-based interventions were targeted to treat individuals who were already overweight or afflicted by co-morbidities, not to prevent disease even though this type of intervention is clearly beneficial to everyone," said Michael Rosenbaum, M.D., professor of clinical pediatrics and clinical medicine, department of pediatrics, Columbia University Medical Center, and a co-principal investigator of ROAD. "ROAD is unique in that it provides an education and fitness intervention to all middle-school students while using data from each student to examine risk factors for the medical complications associated with being overweight and how these risk factors can be addressed by a school-based intervention."

Pilot studies involving over 70 eighth-grade students have already shown that education and fitness interventions have direct benefits on multiple physical and biochemical indices of health in all students.

"ROAD is an example of AMDeC's success in bringing together New York biomedical researchers for team science projects that address critical healthcare needs," said Maria Mitchell, Ph.D., president and CEO of AMDeC.

AMDeC's members participating in ROAD are Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, Maimonides Infants and Children's Hospital of Brooklyn, Winthrop University Hospital, Schneider Children's Hospital of the North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System and Mount Sinai School of Medicine.  

About AMDeC

AMDeC, the Academy for Medical Development and Collaboration, has brought together New York's world-renowned biomedical research institutions to foster the sharing of ideas, capabilities and resources. For more information, visit www.amdec.org or send an e-mail to [email protected].

SOURCE AMDeC