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  • Feb15

    How To Recognize If Your Child Is Obese: Results from a Pediatrician’s Office

    Posted in: Child Obesity, High Cholesterol, Obesity and Weight Loss

    Many studies now show parents underestimate their overweight kids’ weight.

    A New York pediatrician’s office shows that barely 10% of parents of overweight kids actually thought their kid was overweight.

    In contrast, fully 60% of parents of normal-weight kids knew that their kid’s weight was normal. Parents of overweight kids were off by an average of 45%tile.

    Parents of normal-weight kids who underestimated are more likely to be concerned about their child’s weight than parents who get it right.

    Parents most likely to make changes are those who knew that they themselves were overweight, had overweight kids over 8 years old, and those who thought their kid had a health problem.

    Obese children have a high risk of diabetes, high cholesterol and metabolic syndrome. These are all disorders thought only to occur in adults–like my patients–until several years ago.

    Bottom line: parents have a hard time discerning when their child is overweight, and it is different for adults than for kids.  For kids, use the BlubberBusters BMI for kids calculator: good, clear explanations and info.

     

  • Oct25

    Getting Kids to Eat Vegetables

    Posted in: Aging and Costs of Aging, Child Obesity, Obesity and Weight Loss, Recipes, Uncategorized, Wellness and Health

    Avoiding and treating child obesity is not the only reason to get kids to eat vegetables.

    It’s helping them start on a lifetime of flavorful eating.  Flavor is the missing ingredients in many good-for-you foods because too many adults lack the simple cooking, shopping and choosing skills to make vegetables taste good.

    That problem goes away if you buy local, by the way. The freshest vegetables usually need the least cooking.

    The usual place kids find flavor is junk and fast foods. And that warps their palates, and quite possibly, sets up an addiction cycle…if their brains work like adults’.

    Thursday I’m doing 4 easy kids recipes for the Foodbank: Sweet Crunchy Jicama Sticks, Parmesan Kale Chips, Warm Stuffed Dates and BBQ Tofu.  Total kitchen time: 30 minutes!

    The secret here is not disguising the veggies, or adding extra sugar/coatings/junk, but making them appealing on their own. Surprisingly, this isn’t popular as two other approaches:

    • Jessica Seinfeld’s Deceptively Delicious is about hiding the carrots in the meatloaf, and the zucchini in the bread.  That  makes the parent feel better, and does get vegetable into the kid. But a vegetable is not a pill, or a medicine.
    • Weelicious is about fun: great photos and spunk. Sugar and coatings are on zucchini and carrots. It’s easy peasy for the stressed parent of a baby or toddler who wants more health. Vegetable is usually a seasoning, instead of the main event.

    Is there a better way? We’ll find out, at the Foodbank of Santa Barbara and its reception and benefit this Thursday 10.28.10

     

  • Jul21

    Vending Machines in Kids’ Hospitals

    Posted in: Aging and Costs of Aging, Child Obesity, Obesity and Weight Loss, Wellness and Health

    The most visible food in the hospital is in vending machines. And it isn’t pretty: see the unedited photo at right.hospital vending machine

    In the U.S., we have 25% more vending machines in each children’s hospital than does Canada. In fact, U.S. kids’ hospitals average 9.3 vending machines each.

    What’s in hospital vending machines? 99 out of 101 kids hospitals have soft drink vending machines.  30% of all beverages inside are soda; fewer than 20% are water.  One quarter of offerings are candy: more than any other food.

    In schools with vending machines, kids buy more sugar-sweetened soda than anything else. And soda, more than any other food, causes childhood obesity. Candy and chips, the next best-selling vended items nationally, are second and third.

    But the people who make their way down to the glassy doors of treats 365/24/7 are not just kids.

    They’re adults: parents, visitors, staff.  Chef Clinic research has shown that in-hospital eating is one of two major predictors of physician obesity.

    Many people overeat when they are stressed, and turn to junk food as comfort.  The vending machine provides that.  And makes you fat, at the same time.

    Good vending choices do exist from usual vendors and healthy vending others. Some health care institutions in California have developed policies that set nutrition standards for foods and beverages in vending machines. That’s the right direction.

    But you shouldn’t have to wait, the next time a child is sick, for food that helps you stay healthy and strong. After all, it’s a hospital.

     

  • Feb9

    Child Obesity: The Way Forward, on a Diet (plus Moving)

    Posted in: Wellness and Health

    I can’t wait as Michelle Obama now bares her new tools and guns for “Let’s Move” to fight child obesity.

    Maybe she can help school officials to change their thinking even more.

    For example, why is it “parents’ responsibility to forbid children at risk of obesity to buy candy” as the Orange County High School rotund principal insists, as a school secretary (is this retro, or what?) gives the go-ahead for daily rounds with Skittles and other day-glo candy, picking up teen pocket change here, there and everywhere?

    Paradoxically, candy rounds are for uniforms and equipment for athletic teams.

    The CDC and Dr Bill Deitz have it right: pediatric obesity has leveled off (about 1/3 of kids are obese or overweight) and one reason is that some schools (other than OC obove) are starting to get it. Get the soda and candy out, and water and better snacks in.

    But at first blush, Let’s Move still seems to be about helping kids to eat burgers and fries and ice cream and cake. Haven’t we had 30 years of too much of that?

    Helping kids with their weight means putting some of them on a diet…and their principal. A diet that is an eating plan that they can live with, whether or not they know it’s a diet. The adults will know.

    But the kids might just learn and love that they’re getting real food, not fake food. And real food for kids is the way forward, for kids who need to lose weight and keep it off, forever.

     

  • Jan14

    17 Winning Ideas for Child Obesity

    Posted in: Child Obesity, Obesity and Weight Loss

    How can we raise kids’ awareness of the benefits of fresh food so they can make better choices?Read the challenge brief

    This question was posed by OpenIdeo and Chef Jamie Oliver: they winnowed nearly 600 ideas to a top 17.

    The winnowing process seems like popularity plus social networking plus eye appeal.  But that’s a good way to start: to help get kids healthier, they have to feel it, not just be told it.

    Here’s a free downloadable e-book of these 17 ideas.

    Here’s my favorite three:

    Role Model Chefs: cool, junior chef teens in school teach younger, impressionable kids how cool it is to cook, sans chef knives.  (Disclosure: I hope to work with the SB Foodbank on a cooking competition, of sorts, for kids this year).

    What’s for Dinner?  the last class of the day in school is making a meal for home. Yes, it requires a little adjustment. But the power to influence Mom’s health, Dad’s health, sister’s health and the child’s self-esteem is huge.

    We did this for adults in a junior high home ec classroom in the suburbs…the only problem was enough take-out containers.

    Color Coded Compartment Cart (for Shopping): will work best when huge items not needed, but what a great, if temporary reminder of what is full and what is empty.  There are now plates available with portion control painted in the middle. Why not carts?

     
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