By: Michelle Zweifler

We all want our nieces, nephews—and all kids—to be happy and healthy. And while a balanced, healthy diet should be encouraged at home by family, as well as in school, the number of obese children continues to rise.

The first way to help children is through prevention, i.e. helping to keep nieces and nephews at their ideal body weight, and/or helping them return to their ideal body weight should they begin to gain weight beyond what their physician says is healthy for them. While children are growing, they require the appropriate amount of calories for development. Fruit, vegetables, and lean meats for protein, help children and adults maintain a healthy weight. Avoiding sugar, soda, and fried foods are recommended to prevent obesity. Portion control is also important; meat portions should be the size of the child’s palm, and carbohydrates and fruit and vegetables should be about the size of their fist. Exercise and activity also helps burn calories.

It’s also important to understand the effects of childhood obesity; it can lead to many medical problems. Children can develop diabetes, high blood pressure, sleep disorders like sleep apnea, and elevated cholesterol, to name a few. And, obese children frequently have excess fat, stretch marks, gynecomastia (male breast tissue) and mammary hypertrophy (enlarged female breasts). Some of these issues may require additional medical attention, or even plastic surgery.

In the case of severe obesity, weight loss surgery (bariatric surgery) may be beneficial for some adolescents that have failed traditional weight loss methods and suffer from medical problems. Teen bariatric surgery may involve a band placed around the stomach restricting the amount of food consumed. It is usually performed laparoscopically with small incisions.

It’s important to understand that plastic surgery is not performed for weight loss. A plastic surgeon can assess if teenage plastic surgery may play a role for appropriate candidates for removal of gynecomastia and breast reductions. Breast surgery depends partially upon the duration of symptoms. Liposuction to spot-treat excess fat deposits is usually deferred to eighteen years of age. Realistic expectations are important for all plastic surgery patients.
We have to be good role models, so modeling good, healthy eating and exercise will go a long way.

Photo: shakzu
Published: July 27, 2015