Abstract
Adequate levels of physical activity are important for population health. Policy databases can track, monitor, and compare the development and implementation of physical activity policy actions and are populated by different methods. The new MOVING database, developed through the Confronting Obesity: Co-creating Policy with Youth (CO-CREATE) project, collates governmental policy actions designed to increase physical activity and is populated by an in-depth scan of implemented national policy actions. This paper presents lessons learned from conducting the policy scan across 27 European countries. Policy actions were identified using a structured search protocol from preselected sources, assessed against pre-specified inclusion criteria and verified by an in-country expert. 625 eligible national implemented policy actions were identified. Challenges included policy actions falling out of scope, a lack of available information on policy actions, difficulty in identifying policy actions using specific search terms, and increased resource requirements for translation of policy actions into English. The scan indicated improvements, which informed protocol modifications. Identifying the challenges and opportunities around conducting a policy scan is necessary to understand and assess the reliability, validity, and utility of a policy database. The policy scan will help to deliver a comprehensive picture of physical activity policy actions across Europe.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | e13523 |
| Journal | Obesity Reviews |
| Volume | 24 |
| Issue number | S1 |
| Early online date | 22 Nov 2022 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 28 Feb 2023 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:This project (Confronting Obesity: Co‐creating Policy with Youth, known as the CO‐CREATE project) has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No. 774210. This document reflects only the authors' views, and the European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains.
© 2022 The Authors. Obesity Reviews published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of World Obesity Federation.
Funding
The MOVING database of physical activity policy actions (and its sibling, the NOURISHING database) uses a combination of methods and is populated by an in‐depth systematic policy scan and in‐country government expert verification. It was developed by World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) International as part of the 5‐year project (known as the CO‐CREATE project), funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program. CO‐CREATE, which started in 2018, has an overarching aim to reduce child and adolescent obesity and its co‐morbidities by working with adolescents to develop, inform, and disseminate evidence‐based policies to tackle obesity in young people. While several different policy databases exist in relation to a range of NCD risk factors, the project identified a gap of a repository that contained in depth information about physical activity policy actions that could be used by youth to empower them to take part in participatory policy processes. Consequently, a database and search protocol were developed. 26 27,28 Confronting Obesity: Co‐creating Policy with Youth 30 30 This project (Confronting Obesity: Co-creating Policy with Youth, known as the CO-CREATE project) has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No. 774210. This document reflects only the authors' views, and the European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains. This project (Confronting Obesity: Co‐creating Policy with Youth, known as the CO‐CREATE project) has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No. 774210. This document reflects only the authors' views, and the European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains.
Keywords
- noncommunicable disease
- obesity
- physical activity
- policy scan
- public policy
