Assessing Childhood Obesity

Medical Q&A [Moderated]
1

I was curious what the Barbell Medicine doctors’ preferred method of assessing childhood obesity would be—namely, how does one know if they should recommend that a child should lose weight due to excess bodily fat that may be harming their health? For adults, waist circumference can be a useful tool. Is there such a reference for children? It seems more difficult due to fact that children are still growing.

2

BMI percentiles in compared to the growth chart would be our method. In adults, it’s BMI + waist circumference due to BMI missing ~50% of people who are carrying too much body fat. It’s a bit better in kids, but still not perfect.

Here are the current clinical practice guidelines for reference:

https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/151/2/e2022060640/190443/Clinical-Practice-Guideline-for-the-Evaluation-and