Health Problem Obese Child Faces

A health problem obese child faces can range from things like the future likelihood of diseases like diabetes and heart disease to things like childhood asthma. Being a heavy kid is statistically proven to raise your chances of growing up to be a heavy adult. The health problem obese child faces are serious, but losing weight and getting healthy as soon as possible can greatly reduce those serious risks.

A health problem obese child faces that not many people think of when they think of heavy kids is the potential for arthritis and joint problems. While it’s obvious that a heavy adult has a better chance of developing arthritis, bad knees and other joint problems, few people think of these things in terms of childhood obesity.

But when a child is obese, their bodies and joints are carrying that extra weight longer than the adult who becomes overweight. In some cases with very obese kids, the extra weight can actually cause bones and joints to develop abnormally.

When the joints are under more pressure than they were designed for and they’re still growing, it can cause some serious problems. Even if they grow normally, they’re still faced with carrying more weight than they should.

Most arthritis is caused by years of wear on a joint. When that wear is made worse by a person being heavy as a child, that means they’ve had more years of wear than a normal weight adult. This makes the risk of early arthritis and other joint conditions a very real one.

Damage and chronic problems with the ankles and knees are more likely to occur at a young age. And a health problem obese child faces at a greater risk is something called slipped capital femoral epiphyses or SCFE.

This is a damaging hip condition that requires surgery to minimize damage to the hip joint. It occurs with much greater frequently in obese kids and adults than in those of a healthy weight.

Asthma is another condition that can be brought on or worsened by childhood obesity. If a child is going to develop asthma, that the child is overweight can make it an extra difficult disease to deal with.

If a child develops asthma, then getting out of breath during exercise or play can bring on an asthma attack. If the child is overweight or obese it takes less time to get out of breath, raising the potential for attacks.

It’s also going to be more difficult for a heavy child to lose weight if the fear of an asthma attack curbs the ability to exercise. The inability to exercise efficiently because of asthma can lead to weight gain, which only exacerbates all these other problems.

Another condition that’s more prevalent in heavy kids is depression. A kid’s self-esteem and self-confidence is often very closely tied to body image. When a child is upset about being fat it’s easy to get depressed which makes it more difficult to lose weight. This is a health problem obese child faces that losing weight can also help with.