Resumen

LAURENTIN, Alexander. Venezuelan experience in the study of the nutrition transition: The TAN group. An Venez Nutr [online]. 2014, vol.27, n.1, pp.185-188. ISSN 0798-0752.

In March 2005, the Bengoa Foundation committed a number of professionals to the challenge of food and nutritional issues in Venezuela. On July 11th 2005, the founding meeting of the TAN group (short for “Nutrition Transition Task Group”) took place with the presence of Mercedes López de Blanco, Melania Izquierdo and Alexander Laurentin. The TAN group is an interdisciplinary and inter institutional group that debates and discusses ideas, in order to identify and develop strategies on nutrition transition. In Venezuela, this transition has resulted in the double burden of malnutrition, as overweight coexists with under nutrition. The task group decided to address the overweight problem. The first activity was a forum held on November 2005, where it was detected that various research groups in Venezuela use different criteria and cut-off limits to identify risk factors and diagnose diseases related to nutrition, particularly in children and adolescents. The TAN group, with an action research approach, addressed this problem: An electronic survey detected variability in the use of the references, inconsistencies between a particular reference and the variables used, and a deficit on lifestyle evaluation; therefore, a workshop was designed (using a clinical case). This activity has benefited a hundred of Venezuelan pediatricians and trained ten facilitators across the country.

Palabras clave : Nutrition transition; task group; action research; Venezuela.

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