Grant: Knowledge Synthesis Grant

<html> <body> <p>The Canadian Physical Activity (PA) Guidelines for the Early Years (ages 0-4 years) have been a useful starting point for providing PA targets for children of the early years. However, after five years, there is reason to update the evidence and re-consider the guidelines in their current form. To ensure guidelines are true to the evolving scientific evidence, updates should be performed every 5 years.^1,2 Furthermore, information on the relationship between the frequency, intensity, time, and type of PA and health indicators in the early years was not available.¹ Thus, the goal of this project is to complete a systematic review update and expansion to inform an update of the Canadian PA Guidelines for the Early Years.<br> <br> The project team is uniquely qualified and positioned to lead and successfully complete this important knowledge synthesis project. Most team members have extensive experience with systematic reviews, meta-analyses, guideline development and evaluation. Many on the team have been working with the Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology (CSEP) since 2006 to revise and create Canadian PA guidelines for the early years, children, youth, adults and older adults. Our team includes Independent Researchers with extensive expertise in PA in the early years, related health implications, determinants, health promotion strategies, interventions, and communications, research synthesis, guideline development, and evaluation of the impact of public health guidelines. Our team also includes a librarian with expertise updating systematic reviews, and a systematic review and guideline development process expert. Our Knowledge Users represent national organizations with experience translating scientific evidence into public health guidelines and public-facing materials. Organizations were chosen strategically to ensure that guidelines would be national in scope, bilingual and convey a message relevant to most Canadians.<br> <br> The update of the Canadian PA Guidelines for the Early Years will be proactively guided by the Appraisal of Guidelines Research and Evaluation II (AGREE II) instrument,^3,4 the internationally-recognized standard for guideline development and assessment. The systematic review will be guided by the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) framework.⁵ Both tools are intended to ensure systematic, rigorous and transparent processes are followed. Two interactive in-person sessions, including a planning meeting and guideline update meeting, will be held in Ottawa to address project objectives, in accordance with previous practice and published recommendations.⁶ <br> <br> Updated PA guidelines based on a synthesis of the latest evidence will ensure parents, early child care educators/providers, public health/health care professionals, and governments have the appropriate information on PA during the early years for optimal health. The uptake of our previous guideline was impressive with 113 million media impressions in Canada related to its release. Additionally, between March 2012 and December 2015, the guideline page, where free downloads are available, was visited almost 475,000 times. The proposed project has the ability to have a similar or bigger impact by continuing to inform efforts aiming to optimize health and prevent future chronic diseases in our youngest Canadians, as well as informing the update of similar guidelines in Australia and the United Kingdom.</p> </body> </html>