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The increasing prevalence of obesity in the United States (US) is well documented and presents a significant challenge for healthcare providers working with under-resourced communities that often face great obstacles to health-related weight loss. Specifically, it has been reported that obesity disproportionately affects US Latino communities. Yet, little is known about what obesity lifestyle interventions currently exist. Healthcare professionals working in predominantly Latino communities might be interested in learning about the designs and outcomes of existing lifestyle interventions that have been specifically tailored for Latino communities. Here, we report the results of a systematic review of obesity lifestyle interventions targeting Latino adults. We examine the designs and outcomes of the nine articles that met our inclusion criteria. All the studies had physical activity and/or nutritional education components, measurements of both crude weight loss and body mass index (BMI), and some used culturally relevant intervention designs. Two of the nine studies reported significant between-group differences in BMI. Significant barriers between studies include small sample size, low retention rate, enrollment, low adherence, differences in control group activities, and differences in outcomes measured. We recommend that future obesity interventions select and report BMI, raw weight, and body fat percentage as outcome variables and that multiple measurements over multiple days be recorded for pre- and post-intervention data points. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To examine the association between walnut consumption and measures of cognitive function in the US population. Design: Nationally representative cross sectional study using 24 hour dietary recalls of intakes to assess walnut and other nut consumption as compared to the group reporting no nut consumption. Setting: 1988-1994 and 1999-2002 rounds of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). Population: Representative weighted sample of US adults 20 to 90 years of age. Main Outcome Measure: The Neurobehavioral Evaluation System 2 (NES2), consisting of simple reaction time (SRTT), symbol digit substitution (SDST), the single digit learning (SDLT), Story Recall (SRT) and digit-symbol substitution (DSST) tests. Results: Adults 20-59 years old reporting walnut consumption of an average of 10.3 g/d required 16.4ms less time to respond on the SRTT, P=0.03, and 0.39s less for the SDST, P=0.01. SDLT scores were also significantly lower by 2.38s (P=0.05). Similar results were obtained when tertiles of walnut consumption were examined in trend analyses. Significantly better outcomes were noted in all cognitive test scores among those with higher walnut consumption (P < 0.01). Among adults 60 years and older, walnut consumers averaged 13.1 g/d, scored 7.1 percentile points higher, P=0.03 on the SRT and 7.3 percentile points higher on the DSST, P=0.05. Here also trend analyses indicate significant improvements in all cognitive test scores (P < 0.01) except for SRTT (P = 0.06) in the fully adjusted models. Conclusion: These significant, positive associations between walnut consumption and cognitive functions among all adults, regardless of age, gender or ethnicity suggest that daily walnut intake may be a simple beneficial dietary behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]