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Cited by 22Mobile Health and mHealth ApplicationsObesity, Physical Activity, DietMobile Learning in Education

Mobile Health Interventions Addressing Childhood and Adolescent Obesity in Sub-Saharan Africa and Europe: Current Landscape and Potential for Future Research

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Reddy, Priscilla, Dukhi, Natisha, Sewpaul, Ronel, Ellahebokus, Mohammad Ali Afzal, Kambaran, Nilen Sunder, Jobe, William·2021·Frontiers in Public Health
DOI 10.3389/fpubh.2021.604439PMC PMC7991289
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Abstract

Child and adolescent overweight is a growing public health problem globally. Europe and low and middle-income (LMIC) countries in Sub-Saharan Africa provide sufficiently suitable populations to learn from with respect to the potential for mobile health (mHealth) interventions in this area of research. The aim of this paper is to identify mHealth interventions on prevention and treatment of childhood and adolescent obesity in Sub-Saharan Africa and Sweden and report on their effects, in order to inform future research in this area. A search of peer-reviewed publications was performed using PubMed, ScienceDirect, EBSCOhost, and Scopus. The search included all articles published up to August 2019. The search strings consisted of MeSH terms related to mHealth, overweight or obesity, children, adolescents or youth and individual countries in Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa. Second, a combination of free-text words; mobile phone, physical activity, exercise, diet, weight, BMI, and healthy eating was also used. Seven studies were reported from Europe and no eligible studies from Sub-Saharan Africa. The results of this narrative review indicate a lack of research in the development and testing of mHealth interventions for childhood and adolescent obesity. There is a need for an evidence base of mHealth interventions that are both relevant and appropriate in order to stem the epidemic of overweight and obesity among children and adolescents in these countries. Uptake of such interventions is likely to be high as there is high penetrance of mobile phone technology amongst adolescents, even within poor communities in Africa.

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  • Socioeconomic and infrastructural differences between HICs and LMICs may influence the effectiveness and feasibility of interventions, and limited access to technology, financial resources, and trained personnel in LMICs may hinder the successful implementation of tech-driven and multi-component interventions that have been promising in HICs.

    “For example, the socioeconomic and infrastructural differences between HICs and LMICs may influence the effectiveness and feasibility of interventions [54–56] or limited access to technology, financial resources, and trained personnel in LMICs may hinder the successful implementation of tech-driven as well as multi-component interventions that have been promising in HICs [29, 43, 54–56].”

    From School-based healthy eating interventions for adolescents aged 10–19 years: an umbrella review (2024) · cites this paper as [56]

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Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Reddy, P., Dukhi, N., Sewpaul, R., Ellahebokus, M. A. A., Kambaran, N. S., & Jobe, W.
Affiliations
  • Human Sciences Research Council (ZA)
  • University West (SE)
Corresponding author
Dukhi, Natisha
ORCID
Venue
Frontiers in Public Health
Publisher
Frontiers Media SA
Published
2021-03-11
Volume
9
Pages
604439-604439
ISSN
2296-2565 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.3389/fpubh.2021.604439
PMC
PMC7991289
OpenAlex
W3135649439
Cited by
22
References
3
Citations by year
2026: 6 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 7 · 2022: 3
FWCI
0.67
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Frontiers in Public Health (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Nelson Mandela University Research Repository (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
Funders
Department of Higher Education and Training
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Mobile Health and mHealth Applications
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Obesity, Physical Activity, Diet
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Mobile Learning in Education
Keywords
mobile health intervention, childhood obesity, adolescent obesity, childhood overweight, obesity prevention, obesity treatment, sub-Saharan Africa, Sweden, low- and middle-income countries, physical activity, diet, healthy eating, mobile phone technology, research gaps
MeSH terms
Adolescent, Child, Europe, Humans, Sweden, Telemedicine, Africa South of the Sahara, Pediatric Obesity

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