Some of Georgia’s older adults will lead healthier lives after improving their fruit and vegetable intake, physical activity, and diabetes self-management skills by participating in an educational community intervention project, according to the Georgia Department of Human Resources, Division of Aging Services (DAS). Georgia has the 11th fasting growing population of older people in the country with more than 870,000 persons aged 65 and older, and ranks seventh in the number of older people with diabetes.

“With aging comes increased health problems and health care costs. This community intervention is designed to improve physical activity, nutrition, and diabetes self-management skills in older adults to help them prevent and to manage chronic diseases and remain living independently in their homes,” said DAS Director Maria Greene.

DAS, in partnership with the University of Georgia (UGA), the Georgia Aging Network, the Division of Public Health and other public/private sector agencies developed, implemented and evaluated the statewide community intervention program called “Live Healthy Georgia--Seniors Taking Charge,” which consisted of health promotion activities to help improve the quality of life of older adults living in the community. As a result, the program participants who reported engaging in physical activities for at least 30 minutes, five or more days a week, increased from 53% to 64%. Participants who consumed at least five servings of fruits and vegetables a day increased from 29% to 52%. Those with very poorly controlled blood sugar had a 1% decrease in their A1c test, which is the gold standard test for diabetes management.

There was statewide training at 40 senior centers which included pre-testing, post-testing, educating, evaluating, analyzing and report writing. There were 815 participants who represented the diversity of older people attending senior centers in Georgia. Their average age was 74 years: 16% were men, 84% were women; 44% were white, 55% were African Americans, and 1% was another ethnicity/race.
Wellness coordinators implemented and evaluated the community intervention, ensuring that all pre-testing and post-testing were performed, and collaborated with many community partners including the aging services network, senior centers, public health departments, extension service, hospitals, pharmacies, and other health service providers, recreation departments, and universities.

The diabetes intervention procedures included having senior centers complete a pre-test and post-test (blood A1c, blood sugar, and questions about diabetes self-management). They also provided eight training lessons on diabetes self-management. Both the diabetes and community intervention training consisted of walking and chair exercises; games; menus and recipes demonstrations and other activities; and eight lessons on the importance of fruits and vegetables.

The interventional materials and report are available at http://www.livewellagewell.info/study/materials.htm.

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