Guiding Families to Healthier Living with Children’s Hospital Healthy Lifestyle Clinic

Disclosure :: this post is sponsored by Children’s Hospital.

Guiding Families to Healthier Living with Children’s Hospital Healthy Lifestyle Clinic

Ever since King Numa Pompillus of Rome added January to the calendar around 700 BC, January has represented a time of review and rededication: a time for new beginnings. This January, Children’s Hospital is rededicating our commitment to help New Orleans families with one of those most common resolutions: moving to healthier living.

The Children’s Hospital Healthy Lifestyle Clinic is devoted to guiding children and their families back to more healthful choices.  

You may well ask: is this important at my child’s age now?

  • Research now reveals that cardiovascular disease associated with obesity, the so-called metabolic syndrome, begins in childhood.
  • We know that 80% of overweight 12 year olds become overweight and obese adults. Alas, they don’t “grow out of it”; there’s no such thing as “baby fat”.
  • It’s demonstrably easier to teach healthier habits to a younger child than to a teenager. This doesn’t mean it is hopeless; simply there is no good reason to postpone dealing with the problem.
  • Fit children do better in school.
  • Nearly every child gets teased in school, but clearly overweight children are disproportionate targets. While not condoning this behavior, one great way out of it is to become healthier and leaner. Many of us wrestle with our internalized self-image from 12 years old, so why not work now to make that a better image?

So, how does the Healthy Lifestyle Clinic help with these adjustments?

chnola healthy lifestyle clinicFirst, we provide a medical evaluation to identify any already existing conditions and medical problems that might interfere with progress. Then, over a series of visits at your pace, we will offer your family problem-solving suggestions to improve your relationship with food and physical activity. Our objective is to help identify and achieve sequential, achievable, short-term goals that will lead to improvements in lifestyle, body composition, and health. Positive approaches are the most successful, so we will help you focus on the “do’s” instead of the “do not’s.”

We will pay close attention to your child’s developmental level and current fitness level as we recommend a gradual increase in physical activity.

We will use a multidisciplinary team approach to help you and your child. Nutritional counseling and physical therapist recommendations will be part of the program.

Self-image is an important factor in adopting lifestyle change. We will teach you and your child to look toward what you are becoming. Psychological support will be available from specialists as needed.

Even if there is only one at-risk child in the family, we will involve the entire family. First, it is likely all the family members can improve their lifestyle, even those who have not yet shown the consequences of those lifestyles. Second, we consider the entire family as teammates. Tyrone Armstead, Brandon Cooks, Ben Watson, and Drew Brees all need to know what their teammates are doing (and why) on each play. Similarly, every member of your family team needs to understand your new plays.

Our goal is not just to change your family’s direction and your child’s life outcome. We anticipate this will change your grandchildren’s health legacy as well. Yes, we can enjoy New Orleans healthfully.

Anyone concerned with their child’s eating habits and weight, can contact the clinic for an evaluation. Referrals from your primary physician are welcome, but not necessary. We will keep your child’s doctor and school advised of your involvement in the program, as you wish. We are centrally located at 3040 33rd Street in Metairie. Appointments are available Wednesday through Friday afternoons from 2 – 5 p.m. and Saturday mornings 9 a.m. – Noon beginning January 16 by calling the Children’s Hospital Outpatient Scheduling Center at (504) 896-2888. Most major insurance plans accepted.

What You Need to Know Before You Go, Logistically Speaking!

Hours ::CHNOLA-After-Hours-Maps_800w

Wednesday – Friday: 2:00 – 5:00 p.m.
Saturday: 9:00 a.m. – Noon

Appointments can be made by calling the Children’s Hospital Outpatient Scheduling Center at (504) 896-2888.

Address :: 3040 33rd Street, Metairie, LA 70001
(at the foot of I-10 and Causeway near the Galleria)

Pediatricians :: John Firestone, Jr., MD and Karen Kern, MD

About Dr. John Firestone, Jr. 

firestoneDr. John Firestone, Jr., is a Board-certified pediatrician and allergist who has been in practice for 28 years in the metro New Orleans area. He works with the Children’s Hospital Healthy Lifestyle Clinic and After Hours Clinic, both housed at the same facility in Metairie.

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