Funded Project Highlights

The Wood County Health Department (WCHD) received funding to implement Parents as Teachers (PAT), a comprehensive, evidence-based home visiting model to increase parent knowledge, provide early detection of developmental delays and health issues, prevent child abuse and neglect and increase school readiness and success. In its first full year of implementation, the PAT program in Wood County conducted over 360 home visits, retained nearly 70% of enrolled families, held 11 group events, and met all but one of the essential PAT requirements. Strategic changes based on community feedback, including improved referral processes and collaborative planning for group sessions, further strengthened the program’s effectiveness. This initiative has laid a strong foundation for sustainable, long-term impact by embedding the PAT model into the county’s broader maternal and child health services. Families now have increased access to culturally responsive, developmentally focused support, and the community is better equipped to foster safe, nurturing environments where children can thrive.

The incidence of obesity has rapidly increased in Wisconsin and across the United States, and more than 65 percent of adults are overweight. Obese individuals are at increased risk for severe diseases including obesity-induced type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, stroke and cancer. Previous research has shown that low levels of ALAS1, an enzyme involved in making the iron-carrying molecule heme for hemoglobin (a process known as heme biosynthesis), correlates with high body mass index and higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes. For this project, researchers hypothesized that ALAS1 may function as a metabolic sink to control the breakdown of amino acids in brown fat tissue. This project gave researchers a better understanding of the role ALAS1 plays in energy expenditure as it relates to obesity.