Effective sociodemographic and clinical factors in weight loss in childhood obesity

Abstract

Aim: Obesity is a more common and important health problem in childhood. We aimed to determine sociodemographic and clinical factors contributing weight loss. Material and Methods: Medical records of 120 obese patients (6-18 years old) applied at least twice for follow-up between 2012 (January)-2016 (September) were reviewed. Age, gender, socioeconomic status, family obesity, comorbidities, medications, operations, exercise frequency, screen time, physical examination findings and biochemical/hormone values [thyroid hormone, fasting insulin/glucose, cholesterol levels, Homeostasis model assesment insulin resistance (HOMA-IR), oral glucose tolerance test results (if applied) were recorded. Patients with a difference between the initial and last body mass index standart deviation higher than -0.2 were defined as "the good losing weight" group; the rest as "the poorly losing weight" group. The SPSS 22.0 program was used for analyzes. Results: Puberty stage showed a significant difference (p=0,019); 65% of patients in the poorly losing weight group but 54% of other group were at stage 4-5 . The initial body mass index standart deviation and exercise frequency were higher in the good losing weight group, the last measured body mass index standart deviation was lower (p=0). In the other group, baseline HOMA-IR was higher (p=0.037); there were more metformin-initiated patients but the difference was not significant. Conclusion: We observed that exercise frequency was higher in cases with good weight loss; therefore, we consider that increasing physical activity is an important step. Other crucial outcomes are that the initial body mass index standart deviation is higher while HOMA-IR is lower in those cases and that puberty stage is higher in poorly weight losing patients.