[ad_1]
Childhood obesity increases the risk of diagnosing asthma, according to a study conducted by researchers at the Nemours Children's Health System. In fact, at least 10% of all childhood asthma cases in the United States could be prevented if children were not obese, according to the authors.
"With these data, it is suggested that reducing the onset of obesity in children would significantly reduce the burden of asthma on public health in children," concluded the researchers.
The study was published today in the journal Pediatrics.
By analyzing the medical records of half a million children in the United States, researchers found that obese people were significantly more likely to be asthmatic than their normal-weight counterparts.
The data is useful for counseling families, said Dr. Terri Finkel, chief scientist at the Nemours Children's Hospital in Orlando. "If you lose weight, it can potentially prevent [an asthma] diagnostic."
"If we can get the message out to children and send them the message, we will have a much better chance not only of preventing asthma, but also of other chronic diseases," she said.
In the United States, a growing number of children are obese. In 2016, more than 18% of American children were obese, compared to 14% in 1999.
The exact mechanisms with which obesity increases the risk of asthma are not known. However, studies have shown that overweight and obese children take more drugs, travel to emergency rooms more often and are more likely to suffer from chronic diseases such as diabetes compared to their normal weight counterparts.
"It's a lot easier for me to tell a child that he's overweight or obese but that it's a lot harder to change his lifestyle. We have to try, "said Finkel.
The link between asthma and childhood obesity has been debated, but new evidence establishes a stronger association between the two.
A large European study published in September showed that early asthma and wheezing could contribute to an increased risk of developing obesity in the coming years.
This month alone, a study published in the Journal of Asthma documented a strong association between symptoms of asthma and obesity and a sedentary lifestyle among children in Greece.
The research conducted by Nemours is distinguished by its size.
The study is one of the first to use PEDSnet, a multidisciplinary network of eight US children's hospitals, across 22 states. The 5-year database is funded by the Institute for Patient-Centered Results Research, a non-profit organization supported by the government.
The researchers examined the medical records of more than 500,000 children aged 2 to 17 who received medical care from six of the eight university pediatric medical centers between 2009 and 2015.
The results of the study suggest that nearly one million cases of pediatric asthma reported in the United States are directly attributable to overweight and obesity. Obesity also seems to be associated with the severity of asthma, researchers found.
The study also showed that being African American, under the age of 5, was one of the risk factors for diagnosing asthma.
At the same time, being overweight was only a modest risk factor for asthma, which Finkel found surprising.
"It would be interesting to further analyze the data to see if there is a break point," or some body mass index, where the association between asthma and asthma is more important. Obesity becomes significant, said Finkel.
[email protected], 321-436-9205, Twitter; Instagram; Facebook; LinkedIn.
Sign up for health newsletters »
More Titles … »
[ad_2]
Source link
