Ramirez-Varela earns PRIME award to support active lifestyles for Latino children
The UTHealth Houston School of Public Health awarded Andrea Ramirez-Varela, MD, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Pediatrics and the Department of Epidemiology at the UTHealth Houston School of Public Health, with PRIME funding for her study Supporting Active Lifestyles for Latino Children in Galena Park, titled “Futbolito for All.”
“This PRIME Award lays the foundation for my long-term career goals of designing, implementing, and scaling up contextually appropriate, evidence-based, effective, and equity-driven physical activity interventions for Latino youth,” Ramirez-Varela said.
The project is funded for $25,000 from the University of Texas PRIME Award for School of Public Health Faculty and an additional $25,000 from the Rice University Provost’s TMC Collaborator Seed Fund Program, awarded to the co-principal investigator on the project Christopher Kulesza, PhD, Baker Institute Fellow at the Rice University Baker Institute for Public Policy.
Zoabe Hafeez, MD, associate professor in the Department of Pediatrics is a co-investigator, while Tim Walker, PhD, assistant professor, and Derek Craig, PhD, assistant professor, in the Department of Health Promotion and Behavioral Sciences at the UTHealth Houston Institute for Implementation Science, will serve as collaborators. Additionally, Sandra McKay, MD; Shreela Sharma, PhD; and Deborah Salvo, PhD, will serve as mentors for the project.
According to Ramirez-Varela, the issue of physical activity is especially prevalent in Latino children, with only 21% meeting physical activity goals. While extensive research has shown that sports participation is an essential source of physical activity for children, structural barriers such as insufficiencies, safety, infrastructure issues, and a lack of culturally appropriate programming help contribute to disparities in access to sports for Latino children.
“In children, physical activity plays a critical role not only in preventing obesity and associated co-morbidities but also in ensuring optimal motor and cognitive development, with evidence supporting benefits for academic performance, mental, and social health outcomes,” Ramirez-Varela said in her proposal. “Despite its well-recognized benefits, less than a quarter of children/adolescents ages 6-17 meet physical activity guidelines in the United States. Addressing these barriers through contextually relevant, culturally tailored interventions could lead to significant health benefits and help reduce these disparities.”
For Latino children, soccer is the most popular sport, and soccer-based intervention programs can increase physical activity among Latino children; however, using these programs for improving health-related outcomes remains lacking due to youth soccer programs primarily focusing on team or competition performance outcomes.
Ramirez-Varela’s pilot study proposal will examine the real-world effectiveness, acceptability, adaptability, and scalability potential for “Futbolito for all,” a school-based version of “Futbolito in the City,” which is a program sponsored and run by the Houston Dynamo and Dash Charities, which brings soccer programs to low-income communities to train local coaches to teach basic abilities in schools or parks around the Greater Houston area at no cost.
“This pilot study will harness the fact that this programming is scheduled for implementation in Galena Park Schools – Galena Park Middle School and North Shore Elementary School between the Spring and Summer of 2025 – a predominantly low-income, Latino neighborhood in Houston,” Ramirez-Varela said. “Our study will leverage existing collaborations with multi-sectoral community partners.”