Obesity in Children: Causes, Risks, and Prevention

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Obesity in children:
•Health condition when children gain too much weight than
that of the normal
•Different causes include genetic factors, unhealthy food
habits, lack of physical exercises, medical reasons (medical
reasons are very rare)
•Many state that weight issues run in families but not all
children who have family history of obesity are found to be
overweight (Eichen et al. 2018)
•Diet and activity level play an important determining factor
•Average children spends approximately four hours watching
television
•Numbers of inactivity are increasing as computer games,
video games and use of Smartphone are becoming more
popular
Different disorders that
result from childhood
obesity:
•High cholesterol
•Early heart disorders
•High blood pressure
•Bone problems
•Diabetes (Hamilton et al. 2018)
•Skin conditions like that of heat rash,
fungal infections and also acne
Factors that contribute
to childhood obesity:
•Genetics
•Community as well as
neighborhood design
•Metabolism life how the body
changes the food and oxygen into
the energy
•Short sleep duration (Shah et al.
2018)
•Community and neighborhood
design as well as safety
•Eating and physical activity
Risk factors leading to obesity and
child-well-being:
•Children with obesity are found to be at a
higher risk of having chronic health conditions
like sleep apnea, asthma, type 2 diabetes,
bone and joint problems, and risk factors for
heart disease
•Such children are bullied and even teased by
their peers; suffers from social isolation as
well as depression and lower-esteem
•In the long term, child with obesity are seen to
develop into obese adults which affect their
personal and professionals lives in their
adulthood along with physical symptoms like
heart disease, type 2 diabetes, metabolic
syndrome, and many types of cancer
Ways by which parents help children develop
healthy habit:
•Leading by the example where parents themselves have to be physically
fit, undertake physical activities and eating healthy home cooked foods
like fruits and vegetables
•Planning family activities that would help by providing scopes of
exercises like swimming, biking, walking and others (Davison et al.
2018)
•Being sensitive to the needs of the children and making them
comfortable with the physical activities that they like or which are not
embarrassing and too difficult
•Making an effort in reducing amount of time by the family and spending
more time in watching TV or video games
References:
• Davison, K.K., Kitos, N., Aftosmes-Tobio, A.,
Ash, T., Agaronov, A., Sepulveda, M. and
Haines, J., 2018. The forgotten parent: Fathers'
representation in family interventions to prevent
childhood obesity. Preventive medicine, 111,
pp.170-176.
• Eichen, D.M., Matheson, B.E., Liang, J., Strong,
D.R., Rhee, K. and Boutelle, K.N., 2018. The
relationship between executive functioning and
weight loss and maintenance in children and
parents participating in family-based treatment
for childhood obesity. Behaviour research and
therapy, 105, pp.10-16.
• Hamilton, D., Dee, A. and Perry, I.J., 2018. The
lifetime costs of overweight and obesity in
childhood and adolescence: a systematic
review. Obesity reviews, 19(4), pp.452-463.
• Shah, A.S. and Urbina, E.M., 2018. Childhood
obesity, atherogenesis, and adult cardiovascular
disease. In Pediatric Obesity (pp. 527-538).
Humana Press, Cham.