With diabetes and hypertension poorly affecting American adult’s health, The Kenton County Cooperative Extension Nutrition Education Program Assistant worked with senior adults at Colony Senior Apartments to focus their attention on healthy eating by limiting salt and sugar intake. The group also learned how to interpret nutrition facts label to identify sodium, sugars, cholesterol, fats, and carbohydrates, so they could limit these unhealthy ingredients.  

In Kenton County the percentage of adults with diabetes is 10% and hypertension is 32%. Working with the seniors, the NEP Assistant helped them understand how reading nutrition facts labels can help with lowering their sodium and sugar intake. One participant wrote, “I am using what I’ve learned about reading labels to make better choices at the grocery store.”

As a result, eight of the ten participants showed improvement in nutrition practices such as reading nutrition facts label and preparing foods without adding salt.