engleski

HABITS, BEHAVIOUR AND PSYCHOSOCIAL ASPECTS AS RISK FACTORS OF OVERWEIGHT AND OBESITY IN CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS

Overweight and obesity among children and adolescents are multifactorially conditioned in most cases. Multidisciplinary approach is necessary in the implementation of the prevention programmes and treatment.Precondition for good results is behaviour modification which includes change in beliefs and attitudes towards diet and physical activity.For data collection we used “Questionnaire on the nutritional status of surgical patients” that was written for the purposes of this study.Descriptive statistics and chi-square test were used.The survey was conducted from 2010-2013 year.Participants in this study were 249 parents (183 mothers and 66 fathers) whose children were treated at the Department of Paediatric Surgery and Urology.The children were aged 2-18 years (average age was 8 years), treated for congenital malformations, urological diseases, trauma, appendicitis and un-descended testes.In our sample 59%(47) of children and adolescents had normal weight, 19%(47) of them were overweight and 22%(55) were obese.The aim of the study was to assess if there was any difference between these three groups (children with normal weight, overweight and obese children) in relation to their nutrition habits, leisure patterns and frequency of physical activity. We wanted to determine the parents’ beliefs on obesity prevention, their objectivity regarding the nutritional status of their child and possible connections between parents’ beliefs and some psychosocial factors.Our results showed that overweight and obese children have significantly different nutritional habits and behaviour from those with normal BMI.The results, gained through the questionnaire filled in by parents, have shown that overweight and obese children consume more food and eat more when alone, bored or under stress than children with normal weight. They also consume daily more fizzy drinks and carbohydrates than children with normal weight. Overweight and obese children more often face a problem of having few friends (10%) and are more often bullied by children of their age (27%) than children with normal weight.The parents of overweight and obese children believe to a lesser extent that getting into educational programmes on healthy nutrition and psychologist’s, doctor’s or surgeon’s advice could be of any help in obesity prevention as compared to parents whose children have normal BMI.

obesity; overweight; psychosocial risk factors; social correlations

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