Griffin to lead childhood obesity research as GHS Faculty Fellow

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 30 percent of adolescents and close to 27 percent of low-income preschool children in South Carolina are already overweight or obese. Public health sciences faculty member Sarah Griffin is looking to be part of the solution. Recently named a Greenville Health System (GHS) Faculty Fellow, she will help lead GHS-Clemson research in childhood obesity and pediatric population health management.
Griffin will work with the GHS Children’s Hospital Department of Pediatrics to examine the effectiveness and costs of obesity prevention efforts associated with three GHS initiatives: the Greenville Memorial Childcare Center; the New Impact childhood obesity treatment program; and GHS health clinics at Berea, Lakeview and Tanglewood middle schools in Greenville.
“With ever-increasing childhood obesity rates, it is vital that researchers develop evidence-based prevention practices and provide scholarship on the effectiveness of these practices,” Griffin said.[pullquote] “Healthy interventions that change weight-related behavior and prevent or treat obesity benefit everyone: children, their families, health care systems and the community as a whole.”[/pullquote]
Griffin is the third Clemson faculty member to be named a GHS Faculty Fellow. Each fellow is strategically embedded in a GHS department, shifting their focus from their regular teaching duties to developing a comprehensive research agenda with their GHS department.