Weight Management, Family Style

Weight Management, Family Style

Weight management is a key component of a healthy lifestyle although keeping one’s weight on track is often a frustrating and perplexing task. To get the whole family involved in the weight management effort may seem almost impossible.
Simply identifying a younger member of the family as overweight can be a challenge.

A 2015 study from the U.K. found that 31% of parents underestimated their child’s weight status. For a child who is “very overweight” per government guidelines there was an 80% chance the parent would classify the child as healthy weight. Teens themselves are not very good at identifying themselves as overweight as 80% of overweight teenaged boys and 71% of overweight teenaged girls perceived themselves as normal weight. Recognizing that a child is overweight is crucial to preventing the progression to adult obesity. 72% of overweight kindergartners were obese by the time they reached 8th grade. (more…)

Share Childhood Food Memories to Help Combat Childhood Obesity

Share Childhood Food Memories to Help Combat Childhood Obesity

Without question the eating habits we develop as kids helps determine if we are going to be a heavy adult. Almost a third of children and adolescents in the US are classified as either overweight or obese (JAMA 2014; Ogden, CL).

Many of these children become obese adults. If a child’s parents are heavy their risk is doubled for becoming an overweight adult.

Metabolism.com is involved in finding ways to reduce childhood obesity.

The first step is to raise awareness of the dangers of childhood obesity and how crucial it is for young people to learn how to eat properly. For this reason we are kicking off a Facebook and Instagram campaign called “ Food Flashback”.

Food Flashback means sharing memories of how each of us first learned about food and nutrition. Most of us have some vivid recollections of family meals, watching our parents cooking, favorite foods and snacks as a child.

Obesity Related Type 2 Diabetes is More Severe in Teens than Adults

Overweight TeenObesity Related Type 2 Diabetes is More Severe in Teens than Adults

by Gary Pepper, M.D. and Andrew Levine, Pre-Med, Univ of Central Florida

The recently published TODAY study found obesity related type-2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is more severe as a teen than as an adult, and high risk of developing diabetes could be tied to weight gain at an early age.

Between 2004 and 2009 the “Treatment Options for Type 2 Diabetes in Youth Study Group” (TODAY) gathered 700 participants who met the American Diabetes Association’s criteria for this disease.  The participants were monitored for between two to six years.  TODAY’s goal was to assess treatment options and the clinical progression of obesity related T2DM in youth.  The mean age of the 700 participants in the TODAY study was thirteen, the majority being female. Sixty percent of the 700 participants were African American or Hispanic, with the remainder being Caucasian. The mean duration of diabetes for the study’s’ participants was less than seven months. A major worrisome finding from the study is a majority of participants were also discovered to have dyslipidemia, an abnormally high amount of fats (cholesterol, triglycerides) in the blood, as well as high blood pressure (hypertension). (more…)

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