Impact of Delivering a Healthy Lifestyle Intervention: Promotora Findings from Familias Sanas y Activas II.

Abstract

Background: Community health workers, promotoras, have been identified as effective change agents of their community members' health behaviors and health status. However, few studies have examined the effects of delivering an intervention on the promotoras themselves.

Objectives: This study assessed whether promotoras delivering a healthy lifestyle intervention for adults improved their health behaviors and health status from baseline to 6- and 12-months post-baseline.

Methods: Volunteer promotoras were trained to promote healthy lifestyles including physical activity through workshops and free group exercise classes throughout their communities. Twenty completed all required trainings and delivered at least one class during the period between baseline and 12-month assessments. The promotoras were measured on the following variables: Systolic and diastolic blood pressure, waist circumference, weight, and height. Additionally, they reported their health behaviors and status including moderate-to-vigorous physical activity, beverage consumption, sleep duration, and depressive symptoms.

Results: Repeated measures ANOVAs showed statistically significant decreases from baseline to 6 months for systolic blood pressure (p ≤ 0.05), diastolic blood pressure (p ≤ 0.001) and body mass index (p ≤ 0.05). Changes in self-reported measures were not statistically significant although trends were observed with increases in water consumption.

Conclusions: Findings from this study suggest positive effects associated with delivery of a PA intervention. This is one of the first studies to focus on a cohort of promotoras to examine health outcomes from delivering a healthy lifestyle intervention. It is important to further explore these impacts on the community health workers as they have become increasingly essential to the health of some communities.