Childhood Obesity: Health Issue, Determinants, and Treatment

This report examines childhood obesity in Australia, highlighting its significance as a major health concern. It details the disorder's impact on individuals, families, and communities, including physical complications, emotional turmoil, and financial burdens. The report connects childhood obesity to Australia's National Health Priorities and explores its relationship with social determinants like poverty, low education, and obesogenic environments. It also discusses various treatment approaches, emphasizing preventive measures and health promotion strategies to encourage healthy eating habits, physical activity, and discourage sedentary lifestyles. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of awareness and education for parents to combat childhood obesity effectively. The report is supported by several academic references.

Running head: DISORDER OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY
DISORDER OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY
Name of the student:
Name of the university:
Author note:

1
DISORDER OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY
Childhood obesity issue and its effects on the individual, family as well as community:
One of the most concerning health concern faced by the nation of Australia is the
childhood obesity. This disorder is mainly characterized by huge gain of weight that impact the
physiological system of the body resulting in various kinds of physical complications and other
disorders. Moreover, this disorder is also associated with emotional turmoil and mental
instability in many of the children as well (Jasteboff et al., 2018). About 28% of the children as
well as the adolescents in the nation are seen to suffer from situations of obesity as well as
overweight.
Children suffering from obesity are also seen to grow into obese adults increasing the
risks of various chronic ailments. The rate of type-2 diabetes is also increasing in children along
with much other health issue like sleep apnea, flat feet, heat tolerance, tiredness, issue in
digestion and many others. It has been also found that children who are obese often suffer from
depression as well as anxiety due to their inability or lack of performance in sports and many
other activities in schools as well as in communities (Vrijheid et al., 2018). They are also seen to
the face different types of bullying issues which also affect their morale and self-confidence
because of their heavy weight. Therefore, professionals have observed such children to also
suffer from emotional turmoil and lack of motivation.
Family members are seen to suffer from excessive concern about the health of their
children when they suffer from various health concerns because of obesity and overweight. They
become stressed when their children face breathing problems or sleep apnea that affects their
emotional stability making them live poor quality lives. Moreover, seeing their children being
bullied by others as well as discriminated and stigmatized affect their mental health seeing their

2
DISORDER OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY
suffering o children. Moreover, they also have to spend huge amount of money for healthcare
resources because of their children who are suffering from obesity. They also feel guilty and
stressed thinking that they could not ensure safe and happy lives of their children by managing
their health responsibly. All these affect the relationships between the family members resulting
in emotional turmoil and issues within the family (Bleich et al., 2018).
Children suffering from health complications because of obesity cannot attend schools
regularly for which their academics get affected. They cannot study well which in turn affects
their professional aspects of the future resulting in uncertainty of the future or poor employment
opportunities. These impacts the community well-being as those communities cannot flourish.
Communities with high number of obese children cannot be productive as well. Most families
spending their finance of obesity treatments also cannot contribute much to the community.
Obese children grow into obese adults who also suffer from huge number of chronic issues
(Wadden et al., 2018). Therefore expenditure of healthcare resources of the community is spend
on the avoidable health disorder which could be spent on more crucial treatments or on better
development of the community.
Relationship between the health issue and that of national priority health areas:
The issue of obesity has been recognized as the eighth national health priority areas in the
nation. This decision took place in the year 2008 because of high prevalence of the disorder in
the nation and to the extent that it had affected the lives of people in the nation. It has been
found by AIWH, that among the children belonging to the age cohort of 2-4, about 1 in every 5
children are suffering from obesity accounting for about 20% of the total children of that age
cohort in the nation. In the same year of 2014 to 2015, about 275 of the children aged from 5 to

3
DISORDER OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY
17 years have been also found to suffer from either the conditions of obesity or overweight
(Katzmarzyk et al., et al., 2018).
This disorder is considered as one of the national health priority because of the huge
number of chronic disorders that result from the occurrence of obesity and overweight.
Overweight and obesity had contributed to around a percentage of 7 of total health burden in the
nation where 63% of them is suffering from fatal burden of the disorder. This disorder is giving
rise to various health issues like that of cardiovascular disorders, diabetes, osteoarthritis, asthma,
breathing troubles and many others resulting people to live poor quality lives. In the year of
2011-2012, obesity has been estimated to cost huge portion of the nation’s economy of about $
8.6 billion and therefore, in order to make the situation come under control, prevention of
childhood obesity within the communities is extremely important (Hagman et al., 2018).
Relationship between social determinants of health and that of childhood obesity:
Social determinants can be explained as the conditions where people take birth, grow,
work, survive their lifetime and age. These conditions are found to be positively correlated with
that of the well-being and health of the individuals in the nation. One of the most important
social determinants is poverty and low income. When individuals do not have the financial
security, they are seen to settle for cheap and calorie-dense foods like the take-away or fast foods
which contribute to weight gain and increase the chance of obesity in the children of the families.
Another important social determinant of health is the low education level of the family members
as well as lack of health literacy. When parents have low educational level or they lack health
literacy they are not aware of the negative impacts of consumption of fast foods and takeaway.
They are also not aware of the importance of physical activities and also how sedentary lives

4
DISORDER OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY
affect the health of children resulting in obesity. They also do not remain aware of the health
complications that result from obesity in their children. Hence, they tend to follow poor diet
choices and health behaviors that increase the chance of childhood obesity. Another important
social determinant of health is the obesogenic environment (Ludwig, 2018). The excessive
marketing and advertising of the sweetened beverages, fast goods like burgers, chops and others
along with their campaigning in the social; media expose the children and adolescent to poor
choices of food. Moreover, the present day children are more addicted to computer games,
games of Smartphone, social media sites and others thereby leading sedentary indoor lives. This
increases the chance of putting more weight as they do not take part in physical activities. Hence,
these social determinants of health increase childhood obesity in the nation.
Treatment approaches to the disorder:
One of the best treatment approaches that can save the healthcare resources of the nation
and also reduce the burden of the health disorders would be to undertake preventive measures
than to curative measures. Hence, it becomes important for healthcare professionals to focus on
the spreading of awareness about the complications and consequences of the disorder among the
parents of the nation with the help of health promotion. Parents should focus on the development
of food habits of the children where their diet would be containing more vegetables and fruits
than fatty food products like red meat. They should limit the consumption of fast foods and take-
away foods as well as the intake of the sweetened beverages which are very high on calories
(Weihrauch-Blüher et al. 2018). Also habits like eating food in front of televisions or while
playing indoor games should be prevented and children should be advised to eat with parents
who consume nutritious foods. Children would be able to learn about these good food habits
from observational learning. Parents should encourage their children to participate in physical

5
DISORDER OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY
activities as well as in different recreational games. They should join swimming sessions, cycling
activities, dance classes and others which help in burning of calories. Sedentary lifestyles should
be strictly discouraged. Parents should be made aware about the healthy lifestyle choices they
need to take to help their children overcome childhood obesity.

6
DISORDER OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY
References:
Bleich, S.N., Vercammen, K.A., Zatz, L.Y., Frelier, J.M., Ebbeling, C.B. and Peeters, A., 2018.
Interventions to prevent global childhood overweight and obesity: a systematic review. The
Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology, 6(4), pp.332-346.
Hagman, E., Hecht, L., Marko, L., Azmanov, H., Groop, L., Santoro, N., Caprio, S. and Weiss,
R., 2018. Predictors of responses to clinic‐based childhood obesity care. Pediatric
diabetes, 19(8), pp.1351-1356.
Jastreboff, A.M., Chaplin, T.M., Finnie, S., Savoye, M., Stults-Kolehmainen, M., Silverman,
W.K. and Sinha, R., 2018. Preventing Childhood Obesity Through a Mindfulness-Based Parent
Stress Intervention: A Randomized Pilot Study. The Journal of pediatrics, 202, pp.136-142.
Katzmarzyk, P.T., Broyles, S.T., Chaput, J.P., Fogelholm, M., Hu, G., Lambert, E.V., Maher, C.,
Maia, J., Olds, T., Onywera, V. and Sarmiento, O.L., 2018. Sources of variability in childhood
obesity indicators and related behaviors. International Journal of Obesity, 42(1), p.108.
Ludwig, D.S., 2018. Epidemic Childhood Obesity: Not Yet the End of the
Beginning. Pediatrics, 141(3).
Vrijheid, M., Fossati, S., Maitre, L., Grazuleviciene, R., Nieuwenhuijsen, M., Roumeliotaki, T.,
Slama, R., Thomsen, C., Vafeiadi, M., Warembourg, C. and Wright, J., 2018, August.
Environmental Exposures and Childhood Obesity: An Exposome Analysis. In ISEE Conference
Abstracts (Vol. 2018, No. 1).
Wadden, T.A. and Bray, G.A. eds., 2018. Handbook of obesity treatment. Guilford Publications.

7
DISORDER OF CHILDHOOD OBESITY
Weihrauch-Blüher, S. and Wiegand, S., 2018. Risk Factors and Implications of Childhood
Obesity. Current obesity reports, 7(4), pp.254-259.