Obesity Treatment News
Obesity puts children and adults at risk
According to a new study at the Pediatrics Department of the University of Chicago, children who sleep for at least nine hours do not have problems of obesity and the accompanying metabolic disorders like diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
The study indicated that children who consistently get nine to 10 hours of sleep on both weekdays and weekends have the healthiest metabolic profile. “Good sleep routines and sleeping the right amount is the best healthy proposition,” lead author David Gozal said.
Parents should watch for symptoms that indicate their children need to sleep more. Being cranky or less alert are just two of these. Consequences seen during school would probably be behavior problems, poorer execution of cognitive tests and physical injuries.
Catching up on sleep over the weekend is believed to help to a certain extent but those children who were obese already had shorter and more irregular patterns of sleep. These are also the ones who had higher insulin levels — which can lead to type 2 diabetes over a prolonged period — higher levels of “bad” (LDL) cholesterol and higher levels of C-reactive protein, which has been linked to heart disease in later life.
Obesity is defined as an excessively high amount of body fat (or adipose tissue) in relation to lean body mass. The amount of body fat includes concern for both the distribution of fat throughout the body and the size of adipose tissue deposits. Weight standards can be measured in many different ways. The most common is body mass index.
BMI represents weight levels associated with the lowest overall risk to health. BMI is a mathematical formula in which a person’s body weight in kilograms is divided by the square of his or her height in meters. BMI is more highly correlated with body fat than any other indicator of height and weight. Desirable BMI levels may vary with age. According to the National Institutes of Health clinical guidelines on the identification, evaluation and treatment of overweight and obese adults, all adults (aged 18 years or older) who have a BMI of 25 or more are considered at risk for premature death and disability. Individuals with a BMI of 30 or more are considered obese. Health risks increase as severity of the person’s obesity increases.
Other weight tables have been created by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. Theirs is based on their client population.
Factors that contribute to child, adolescent and adult obesity include:
Modifiable (things that can be changed) causes such as:
• Physical activity: lack of regular exercise
• Sedentary behavior: high frequency of television viewing, computer usage and similar behavior that takes up time that could be used for physical activity
• Socioeconomic status: low family incomes and non-working parents
• Eating habits: over-consumption of high-calorie foods and eating patterns such as eating when not hungry, eating while watching TV or doing homework
• Environment: factors include over-exposure to advertising of foods that promote high-calorie foods and lack of recreational facilities
Non-changeable causes include:
• Genetics: children of obese and overweight parents are at greater risk of obesity
Obese people are at risk of developing one or more serious medical conditions, which can cause poor health and premature death. Obesity is associated with more than 30 medical conditions and scientific evidence has established strong relationships with increases in deaths from all causes due to obesity. Preliminary data also shows the impact of obesity on various other conditions. Weight loss of about 10 percent of body weight, for people who are overweight or obese, can improve some obesity-related medical conditions including diabetes and hypertension.
Just a few facts on obesity-related medical conditions:
• More than 75 percent of hypertension cases are reported to be directly linked to obesity.
• Obesity contributes to the main cause of gout — the deposit of uric acid crystals in joints and tissue.
• As many as 90 percent of individuals with type 2 diabetes are reported to be overweight or obese. Obesity has been found to be the largest environmental factor on the prevalence of diabetes in a population.
• Postmenopausal women with obesity have a higher risk of developing breast cancer. In addition, weight gain after menopause may also increase breast cancer risk. Women who gain nearly 45 pounds or more after age 18 are twice as likely to develop breast cancer after menopause than those who remain at a stable weight.
• Women with obesity have three to four times the risk of endometrial cancer than women with lower BMI.
• The effects of obesity on cardiovascular health can begin in childhood, which increases the risk of developing cardiovascular disease as an adult.
• Obesity has been found to decrease the body’s resistance to harmful organisms. A decrease in the activity of scavenger cells, which destroy bacteria and foreign organisms in the body, has been observed in patients with obesity.
If losing weight is high on your list of New Year’s resolutions for your child or yourself, check out “The Top 10 Habits That Can Help You Lose Weight” by Kathleen M. Zelman on WEBMD.
Obesity, Legacy of Smoking Leave Americans Behind in Life Expectancy
America lags many other nations in life expectancy, largely because of obesity and, in years past, lots of smoking. That, at least, is the conclusion of a new study from the National Research Council, the main operating arm of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering.
The report mainly blames the nation’s once-prevalent smoking habit. While only 20 percent of the adult population smokes today, the figure was 40 percent in 1960, and many 1960 smokers are still suffering the effects.
“Fifty years ago, smoking was much more widespread in the United States than in Europe or Japan: a greater proportion of Americans smoked and smoked more intensively than was the case in other countries,” the authors wrote, as Reuters reports.
“Other factors, such as obesity, diet, exercise, and economic inequality, also have likely played a role in the current gap and divergence between the United States and other countries,” the study said.
At 78.3 years, U.S. life expectancy at birth ranks 36th in the world, behind most of Europe, parts of Asia and even Cuba, according to the United Nations. Japan’s life expectancy of 83 years is the world’s highest.
The report had some good news for Americans, however. The authors said that the nation’s declining smoking numbers will result in higher life expectancies in the coming decades.
Turn down the thermostat, your heater may be making you fat
Linda Carroll writes: Lowering your thermostat may reduce not only your spending, but also your weight, a new study suggests.
Researchers suspect that rising indoor temperatures in British and American homes may have contributed to the obesity epidemic. The theory is that we burn fewer calories when our bodies don’t have to work as hard to stay warm, according to a report published in Obesity Reviews.
“Research into the environmental drivers behind obesity, rather than the genetic ones, has tended to focus on diet and exercise – which are undoubtedly the major contributors,” said the study’s lead author, Dr. Fiona Johnson, of the UK Health Behavior Research Centre at University College, London. “However, it is possible that other environmental factors, such as winter indoor temperatures, may also have a contributing role.”
Johnson and her colleagues scrutinized data on indoor temperatures in both the United Kingdom and the United States. They found that both British and American households have bumped up their thermostats several degrees over the last few decades.
For example, bedrooms in the U.S. were heated to an average of 66.7 degrees in the late 1980s, versus 68.4 degrees in 2005. The differences were more striking in British bedrooms, where the average temperature climbed from 59.4 degrees in 1978 to 65.3 degrees in 1996.
Studies have shown that slightly chillier temperatures can lead to increased energy expenditures, Johnson noted. And that’s true even when people bundle up.
“Increased time spent indoors, widespread access to central heating and air conditioning, and increased expectations of thermal comfort all contribute to restricting the range of temperatures we experience in daily life and reduce the time our bodies spend under mild thermal stress – meaning we’re burning less energy,” Johnson said.