Resolution To Childhood Obesity Through Exercise and Diet Research Paper

Resolution To Childhood Obesity Through Exercise and Diet - Research Paper Example According to the American Psychological Association, around one in six children are obese and â€Å"only 30% of children (aged 6 to 17) participated in 20 minutes plus of vigorous physical activity on a daily basis† (Changing diet and exercise for kids, 2012), whereas the prescribed amount of physical activity is sixty minutes. This clearly indicates flaws in the lifestyle that people follow as the reason for the persistence of the problem of obesity in children. An increasingly sedentary lifestyle that arises from various factors such as pressure of studies and addiction to certain forms of technology leads children to abandon the forms of physical activity that they are supposed to engage in. Most children and even their parents do not consider physical exercise as a priority area that needs to be taken care of for the overall health of the child. There are problems associated with this formulation too. Children with disabilities and chronic illnesses were found to have a mu ch higher incidence of obesity. The table given below bears out this statement. Prevalences of overweight and obesity in disabled children and adolescents a) Compared with healthy children and adolescents Disability Percentage of overweight/obesity Healthy comparison group Country Functionally restricted mobility 30% overweight 16% overweight USA (11) Developmental delay 24% overweight 17% overweight Australia (12) 15% obese 6% obese Learning disability 35% overweight 31% overweight USA (11) 21.9% obese 15.7% obese Learning disability 19.3% obese 12.2% obese USA (13) Hearing or visual impairment 18.4% obese Autism 23.4% obese Attention deficit (hyperactivity) disorder 18.9% obese Asthma 19.7% obese Asthma 24.6% overweight 14.2 % overweight Denmark (Reinehr, Dobe, Winkel and Hoffmann, 2010 [the table is directly from the essay]) In such cases the underlying disease is complicated by the problem of obesity and an inability to walk and perform other physical exercises is compounded by the excessive weight of the body. This may lead to pain at the joints as well since the weight of the body becomes too much for the bones to bear. There are other medical problems too that accompany obesity when it occurs in addition to another disease or disability. These compound the misery that the child experiences and the social isolation that results may lead to depression in the child. This would then further diminish the chances of the child taking part in any leisure activities. This heightens the problem of obesity and the cycle is complete. One method of alleviating this problem is through dietary changes that can be introduced for the patient who is obese. This has the ability to cause enormous changes in the weight of the patient. Diet in these cases needs to be closely monitored since eating as an activity may be used by the patient to alleviate the feelings of loneliness and sorrow. The quality that certain foods have, to cause a temporary suppression of depressing th oughts may be the reason behind this. This again feeds into the earlier mentioned cycle, thus worsening the entire situation. The importance of diet, thus, needs to be stressed when one is dealing with a person who is obese. Children who are obese are more likely to develop other diseases early on