Anna Ek

Anna Ek

Principal Researcher
Visiting address: Enheten för pediatrik, Novum, Blickagången 6A, 14157 Huddinge
Postal address: H9 Klinisk vetenskap, intervention och teknik, H9 CLINTEC Pediatrik, 171 77 Stockholm

About me

  • I am a senior researcher and dietitian with 20 years’ work experience in both clinical and research settings. 

  • I have conducted and evaluated several extensive intervention studies with a focus on what support we should give to families, children and adults living with obesity. Since 2023, I also work clinically as a dietitian in the team at Rikscentrum Barnobesitas, Specialistmottagningen Liljeholmen, Karolinska University Hospital. 
  • The research I have carried out over the years has, among other things, investigated the effect of sports camps for children with obesity, how we can prevent childhood obesity through targeted interventions for families with young children, which instruments we should use to measure children's and parents' obesity related behaviour, how we can increase physical activity in adults through active transport, if a parenting skills training program (More and Less, ML, PI: Paulina Nowicka) is an effective treatment for obesity in preschoolers in Sweden as well as in Europe. Through qualitative research, a great interest has been how we can strengthen weight management for children considering both families and health care professionals perspectives. Through a commissioned training at KI, I now train and supervise healthcare providers to become ML group leaders. In my research I continue to develop ML, now for older children. Currently I am involved in EU-projects (PI: Ioannis Ioakimidis) using novel methods to improve digital health systems to support both adults and youth in their weight management efforts. This includes a role as project manager for the intervention study, BETTER4U, where we want to investigate the role of AI in the development of future treatments for overweight and obesity in adults.

Articles

All other publications

Employments

  • Principal Researcher, Department of Clinical Science, Intervention and Technology, Karolinska Institutet, 2022-

Degrees and Education

  • Degree Of Doctor Of Philosophy, Department of Clinical Science, Intervention and Technology, Karolinska Institutet, 2016

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