Childhood Obesity

Abstract

The purpose of this review is to highlight the risk factors of childhood obesity. The prevalence of childhood overweight and obesity has increased worldwide in recent decades. Obesity in childhood is associated with a wide range of serious health complications and an increased risk of premature illness and death later in life. This book presents childhood obesity trends across multiple demographics. It discusses the contributing genetic and environmental factors of childhood obesity and shows the adverse health consequences of childhood obesity, both as they relate to childhood and as they last into adulthood. The final section presents multiple methods for obesity treatment included community and family–based intervention, pharmacotherapy, and surgical procedures. As childhood obesity increases, scientists think that heart disease, including the condition that may have killed Jonathan, will become a common pediatric disorder. Obesity increases a child’s risk of high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and thickening of the arteries, all of which can lead to heart disease. Obesity also increases a child’s risk of type 2 diabetes, in which the body becomes resistant to insulin, and metabolic syndrome, in which the body simultaneously develops several different risk factors that make a young person more likely to develop heart disease or diabetes, or to have a stroke.