On April 29, The National Collaborative on Childhood Obesity Research (NCCOR) launched the Measures Registry, a searchable database of diet and physical activity measures relevant to childhood obesity research. Childhood obesity and public health researchers have commended the Registry for encouraging the use of common measures and accelerating childhood obesity research. The tool has also garnered a great deal of interest among users.
The launch included a new Registry homepage on the NCCOR site. As of the end of May, the homepage had over 1,907 visitors. Additionally, nearly 22 percent of all of the traffic to the NCCOR site was driven by visits to the tool.
A webinar describing the features and functions of the Registry was held on May 19. More than 260 people joined the webinar.
The Measures Registry includes almost 750 measures in four domains: individual dietary behavior, food environment, individual physical activity, and physical activity environment. Types of measures in the Registry include questionnaires, instruments, diaries, logs, electronic devices, direct observation of people or environments, protocols, and analytic techniques. Users can search for measures and details about how to use them, find measures in development, link to other measures registries and related resources, and submit new measures for inclusion.
NCCOR recently launched another resource for childhood obesity researchers, the Catalogue of Surveillance Systems: www.nccor.org/css. This interactive web tool provides one-stop access to a wide array of obesity-related data sources at multiple levels. Using the Catalogue, researchers can identify data resources, compare attributes across systems, and link to other resources of interest. The Catalogue and the Registry are complementary tools intended to increase obesity researchers’ productivity.
Please visit www.nccor.org for more information about the Registry, a full list of NCCOR-led projects, upcoming events, and childhood obesity research highlights.