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 Overweight 5-year-olds were four times more
likely to be obese by age 14 than children who started kindergarten
at a healthy weight.
Overall, 27 percent of kids in the study were overweight or obese
when they started school and that ratio increased to 38 percent by
eighth grade.
"Half of childhood obesity occurred among children who had become
overweight during the preschool years," researchers led by Solveig
Cunningham of Emory University in Atlanta wrote.
"If we're just focused on improving weight when kids are
adolescents, it may not have as much of an impact as focusing on the
preschool-age years," Cunningham told Reuters Health. The study
"doesn't tell us what to do about it, but it helps tell us when we
need to think creatively about what to do."
"I think it will make pediatricians a little bit more conscious of
helping families and parents with weight-related problems early,"
said Dr. Ihuoma Eneli, medical director at the Center for Healthy
Weight and Nutrition at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus,
Ohio.
"If we can help the child not become overweight by age 5, their
chances of becoming obese are so much lower," Eneli, who wasn't
involved in the new research, told Reuters Health.
Research has shown that the rate of childhood obesity rose from
about 4 percent in the early 1960s to more than 15 percent by 2000.
Most of that research was done in adolescents.
"However, since many of the processes leading to obesity start early
in life, data with respect to incidence before adolescence are
needed," the researchers noted in the New England Journal of
Medicine.
The new data came from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study
conducted by the U.S. National Center for Education Statistics.
Children's weight and height were measured seven times between 1998,
when they were in kindergarten, and 2007.
The obesity rate rose most rapidly between first and third grades —
from 13 percent to almost 19 percent. The rate did not increase
significantly between fifth and eighth grades.
About 32 percent of kids who were overweight when they entered
kindergarten had become obese by age 14. That compared to 8 percent
of normal-weight kindergarteners. Between
kindergarten and eighth grade, the prevalence of obesity rose by 65
percent among white children and 50 percent among Hispanic children.
It more than doubled among black children.
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Among kids from the wealthiest families, roughly 7 percent were
obese in kindergarten and 11 percent by eighth grade.
Well-off children "are not immune," said Eneli.
Among the less-wealthy, obesity rates were much higher. When the
researchers looked at the poorest children, they found 14 percent
were obese in kindergarten and 24 percent in eighth grade.
Cunningham said having a normal weight in kindergarten did not
guarantee that obesity would stay away. "Half of obese eighth
graders do start out at normal weight," she said.
"Even birth weight may be associated with obesity risk,"
Cunningham added.
While roughly 11 percent of babies born weighing 8.8 pounds or less
were obese by kindergarten, the rate was almost 23 percent for those
born weighing more. By eighth grade, about 20 percent of children
born with low or normal weights were obese and just over 31 percent
of children with high birth weights were obese.
"My message for parents is always the same," said Eneli. "Try to
feed your kids in a healthy way, build a healthy relationship with
food, and recognize that there isn't an age that's too young to teach
them healthy lifestyles." ___
Source: http://bit.ly/1jTejiO
New England Journal of Medicine, online Jan. 29, 2014
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