What is obesity?

Also known as: too much body fat.

Growing children and adolescents normally gain weight and height each year and the path that they follow is measured by weight and height charts (growth charts) which define the normal range for each age and sex.

The Body Mass Index (BMI) takes into account whether a child’s weight falls within the normal range taking into account his/her height, age and sex. While there a number of ways to define obesity (a problem that almost 20% of school-aged children suffer from), the BMI is widely used to measure obesity (a BMI greater than the normal range for age, sex and height).

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Reviewed by: Jack Wolfsdorf, MD, FAAP

This page was last updated on: 1/29/2019 3:21:13 PM