Medical Society working to improve health of schoolchildren

It is both wonderful and timely that there have been several recent letters to the editor concerning children's nutrition and even an editorial directed at the schools. As physicians from the Charleston County Medical Society, we have worked diligently with the Charleston County School District by serving on the School Health Committee to address changes that can be made for our children that will improve school nutrition and physical activity.

Childhood obesity, a health care crisis, will not have an easy solution, but interventions in our schools are an important part of the answer. The Charleston County School District and Superintendent Nancy McGinley have always been extremely supportive of any initiative that targets improved health of our students and have been especially proactive in the area of nutrition and fitness. Many tremendous improvements have already been made in our schools including:

--The Student Health and Fitness Act of 2005: We contributed to passage of this law that mandates improved school nutrition and increased physical activity and education throughout South Carolina

--Coordinated School Health Advisory Council: A large group of school nurses, parents, students, a school board member, faculty and staff, as well as community professionals, oversee implementation of that law.

--School nutrition: Food served by the school district has already had many improvements, including serving only low-fat milk, offering water as a beverage and salads.

--Vending machines: Restocking school vending machines with healthier choices and limiting access to machines during school lunch.

--Physical education and activity: Dave Spurlock, director, has been specifically assigned to implement the physical education component of the Health and Fitness Act. At different schools, this has included changes such as walking clubs and morning physical activity programs.

--Measurement of students: Elementary student fitness levels are assessed using the "fitnessgram" test. To determine the actual number of children who are overweight, several community professionals have come together to measure as many of our students as possible. They have measured hundreds of school children, from elementary through high school. In addition, the school district measures a "fitnessgram" of all the students in several grades each year.

--School nurses: During the past 15 years, we have gradually increased the number of school nurses from one nurse serving six schools to at least one nurse at every school. These nurses lead many fitness programs at their individual schools.

--Robert Wood Johnson Healthy Community Initiative: The district and the city of Charleston receive technical assistance concerning childhood obesity programs as one of six cities selected from across the country.

--Obesity Treatment and Prevention Programs: The school district has partnered with outside organizations to create many initiatives, including the MUSC Lean Team (wwwmusic.edu/leanteam), Junior Doctors for Health and the InnerLink Web-based program.

All of this interest is appropriate because childhood obesity is the modern-day equivalent of an epidemic, one that will shorten the lives of this generation.

We are all familiar with the statistics. Approximately 25 percent of the children in South Carolina are obese, a prevalence that has increased over 200 percent during the past 30 years. Obese children become obese adults, suffering from the consequences of metabolic syndrome, a cluster of risk factors, including high blood pressure, high blood lipid levels and diabetes, that cause stroke, heart disease and kidney disease.

We can best address this complex issue by combining our talents and resources to work closely together — community and schools.

Janice D. Key, M.D.

Katharyn Outzs, M.D.

Co-chairs

The Charleston County

Medical Society School Health Committee

Charleston