# Hospitals Offer Obesity Programs for Kids - includes WLS for some.



## Tina (Apr 27, 2006)

I think some of these things are a good idea, just for overall health, but I really, _really_ have a problem with giving WLS to kids.

Found here.

*Hospitals Offer Obesity Programs for Kids*

By JENNIFER C. YATES, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 27 minutes ago

PITTSBURGH - As the waistlines of America's young keep expanding, more hospitals are establishing weight management centers for kids. The programs offer a variety of resources, from nutritional counseling to bariatric surgery for the most extreme cases.

Diane Nellis was worried about the health of her teenage son who weighed 240 pounds. But she didn't put him on a diet. Or send him to a fat camp. She took him to a hospital. There, Trevor Nellis, 17, learned to limit portions to the size of his fist, cut out fast food and soda, and eat more fruits and vegetables. Six months later, he has lost nearly 40 pounds and runs three miles a day.

"We try to promote healthy behavior for a lifetime," said Dr. Goutham Rao, clinical director of the Weight Management and Wellness Center at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh where Trevor got help.

Rao said that when the hospital began planning for the clinic about three years ago, there were about half a dozen similar programs across the country. Now, there are around 50 and more on the way, he said.

The clinics are opening at a time of skyrocketing obesity rates among U.S. children. Nearly 1 out of 5 is obese, according to government figures, putting them at a greater risk for diabetes, heart disease and a host of other problems.

Dr. Sandra Hassink, director of the weight management program at the Alfred I. duPont Hospital for Children in Wilmington, Del., said she's seen patients getting younger and heavier since she helped start the program 18 years ago. Her youngest patient was 5 months old.

"It's scary and we're going to end up with young adults who should be healthy who are bearing the burden of a chronic illness," she said.

A member of the American Academy of Pediatrics' obesity task force and lead editor of the "Parent's Guide to Obesity," Hassink said parents must be involved if a child is going to succeed at keeping weight under control.

Children usually aren't shopping for food or making decisions about what to eat for dinner, said Dr. Christopher Bolling of Cincinnati Children's Medical Center.

"You're not going to have any success if you approach just the child because the child doesn't have complete regulation over the environment. You have to go after the family," said Bolling, medical director for the Cincinnati hospital's weight management center.

Bolling said one of the biggest challenges is finding a way to pay for the weight programs, which usually aren't covered by insurance. Thanks to a $3 million federal grant, the Pittsburgh clinic doesn't charge its patients for the service.

But doctors say no matter what the cost, it's far less than the expense of treating problems from obesity. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, hospitals spent $127 million in 1999 on obesity-related illnesses, up from $35 million in 1981.

At the Pittsburgh hospital program, children see exercise physiologists and behavioral psychologists, along with medical doctors.

Children and their parents are asked to sign a "contract" promising to pursue healthy habits  from changing the way they eat to being more physically active. The words obesity and fat are avoided.

Located in a medical building near the hospital, the clinic's waiting room offers some larger-than-normal chairs for bigger frames.

A nervous Abigail Auria sat in one of the clinic's patient rooms recently, clad in her bathing suit under a paper hospital gown. It was the 12-year-old's first visit and she was waiting to get into the BodPod, an oval, space-age looking contraption that checks kids' body-mass index.

Abigail was referred to the hospital by her pediatrician, who noticed she had been steadily gaining weight.

"It embarrasses me," the girl said.

Her mom, Jamie Auria, who is a diabetic, hopes the center will help her daughter change her lifestyle and avoid getting diabetes herself.

"We don't want to add any risk to what she already has to deal with," Auria said. "But knowing and understanding and actually doing are two different things."

Down the hall, Trevor and his mom proudly talk about all he's accomplished with the center's help. Trevor said talking with doctors about weight loss was different from discussing it with his parents.

"I heard it all the time," Trevor said, "but something like this really motivates you to do it."

___

On the Net:

http://www.chp.edu

http://www.cincinnatichildrens.org

http://www.aap.org


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## BBW Betty (Apr 28, 2006)

These clinics are not really a bad thing as long as they focus on healthy vs. a scale number. But WLS for kids?? What the hell?


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## moonvine (Apr 28, 2006)

I have a problem with a 240 pound male being taken to a hospital for weight loss. Let alone the WLS for kids.


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## EtobicokeFA (Apr 28, 2006)

Overall health (not the scale) I have no problem with. It's the WLS, that I am concerned about.


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## TheSadeianLinguist (Apr 28, 2006)

moonvine said:


> I have a problem with a 240 pound male being taken to a hospital for weight loss. Let alone the WLS for kids.



But this has been a problem longer than most people have known. Go to any treatment center for eating disorders and you'll see a handful of chubby girls diagnosed with "compulsive over-eating" who show no symptoms of it. There are two kinds of compulsive over-eating, the sort where you do nothing but graze all day (I forget the name) and there's binge eating, consuming more than 800 calories in a session on a regular basis. Sure, valid disorders that are VERY dangerous. But, a parent as a kid that's chubby or that likes ice cream a little too much, and they're compulsive eaters, worthy of taking up a bed when people are rupturing their intestines due to this disease. How fucking greedy and selfish is that of a parent to potentially damn some other needier kid to death because they don't like their little fatty? It absolutely burns me up. Just shoot me now.


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## Jay West Coast (Apr 28, 2006)

Jaw-dropping. My country is really screwed up. :doh: I feel really sorry for the kids who might be subjected to that.


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## crazygrad (Apr 28, 2006)

I wonder if for some families it isn't just about weight but about developing healthy habits?

A 240 pound teenager might be very inactive and consuming tons of junk food. A program might help to develop healthy habits so no matter what a person weighs he or she will be active and healthy.


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## TheSadeianLinguist (Apr 28, 2006)

crazygrad said:


> I wonder if for some families it isn't just about weight but about developing healthy habits?
> 
> A 240 pound teenager might be very inactive and consuming tons of junk food. A program might help to develop healthy habits so no matter what a person weighs he or she will be active and healthy.



You know, I've been an inpatient for an eating disorder. No one gets hospitalized because they're lazy and eating too many potato chips, at least not that doctors would admit. IP therapy is pretty damned expensive, and if all you lack is taking walks after dinner and throwing out the junk, it seems a little silly to ship a kid off for something you have to fight to the death for insurance to pay for. (I imagine they're BITCHES about paying for it in this case unless you're really fat.) 

I've been to two IP programs, where I've seen all sorts of people. Frankly, I've never seen one that didn't seem to hold the philosophy that weight was the most important factor. When I talk to other people, I get the same understanding. 

IP programs don't work. I'm proof. It wasn't until I went to OP therapy that I even started getting well, unless you consider weight going up or down depending on the person's "problem" a success. Kids aren't stupid either. Sure, the word "weight" may be avoided, but if it's like every other ED program in the world, they're weighing you every day. I wasn't actually allowed to see my weight at certain points, but I HAD to be a certain weight to go home. How is that humane or fair?

And how can we not see that these people are so clearly advocates of the "perfect body?" They're advocating WLS for kids!


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## crazygrad (Apr 28, 2006)

If this is about an inpatient program, then thats a different story. I thought it was a program sponsored by a hospital and run on an outpatient basis. Several local hospitals around here run such programs. You go once a week for a class and talk about nutrition, exercise, stress management, sleep, etc. That's what I thought the article was talking about- some kind of program that helps learn about nutrition and fitness and help them find ways to incorporate healthy foods and activity into their lives.


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## TheSadeianLinguist (Apr 28, 2006)

I'm not sure from the article. We have no resources like that here. I guess this struck me as an IP philosophy:

"You're not going to have any success if you approach just the child because the child doesn't have complete regulation over the environment. You have to go after the family..."

I may have misread, methinks.


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## moonvine (Apr 28, 2006)

crazygrad said:


> I wonder if for some families it isn't just about weight but about developing healthy habits?
> 
> A 240 pound teenager might be very inactive and consuming tons of junk food. A program might help to develop healthy habits so no matter what a person weighs he or she will be active and healthy.




Or they might be a football player. I just can't see myself getting excited because my male child was 240 pounds, unless he was 3 feet tall. Or for that matter, a female child. 240 does not sound like much to me. At least they didnt' give the kid WLS at that weight.

Most teenage males eat like vacuum cleaners - I hear my friends complaining about their grocery bills. Most of them are not overly picky about what they put in their mouths. And most aren't fat.


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## missaf (Apr 28, 2006)

WLS for kids is another symptom of the "quick fix" mentality associated with WLS for so many who buy into the hype without properly preparing themselves with the knowledge of just how life changing surgery really is. America is so much about instant gratification these days, people would rather look at the quick fix thatn a better long term solution


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## missaf (Apr 28, 2006)

moonvine said:


> Most teenage males eat like vacuum cleaners - I hear my friends complaining about their grocery bills. Most of them are not overly picky about what they put in their mouths. And most aren't fat.



OMG you're not kidding, Moon. When my son started his recent growth spurt, he was eating every 3 hours like he hadn't eaten in days. And he's shot up 3 inches in height and is off the charts for his age group. My grocery bill was a conservative $80 a week with toiletries and cleaning supplies, now it's up to $120! I switched to whole milk, all whole grains in everything to try and help that "full feeling" but he's just ravenous. He's not fat by any means, he just burns energy and calories all day long, even when he's sleeping!


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## rainyday (Apr 29, 2006)

TheSadeianLinguist said:


> There are two kinds of compulsive over-eating, the sort where you do nothing but graze all day (I forget the name) and there's binge eating, consuming more than 800 calories in a session on a regular basis.



Are they really setting the threshhold that low? Aren't some fast food burgers alone that many calories or more? I think I remember reading some of the Arby's sandwiches are. That seems crazy.


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## TheSadeianLinguist (Apr 29, 2006)

IMHO, Rainy, the standards for compulsive over-eating are very low, purposefully, while the standard for diagnosed anorexia or bulemia is very, very high. If I look at certain criteria, like measuring body fat, I'm almost obese at my current weight and height, 5' 5" and slightly below the weight of the "average" woman in the US. (See the waist to hip ratio on bmicalculator.com if you don't believe this.)

The standards for being fat/obese seem insanely low to me. I don't think it's an accident that we value thinness and therefore think fatness is a "disease." Until a person is emaciated, we don't tend to see a problem. /rant

P.S. It's your fault for getting me started, Rainy.


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## moonvine (Apr 29, 2006)

TheSadeianLinguist said:


> IMHO, Rainy, the standards for compulsive over-eating are very low, purposefully, while the standard for diagnosed anorexia or bulemia is very, very high. If I look at certain criteria, like measuring body fat, I'm almost obese at my current weight and height, 5' 5" and slightly below the weight of the "average" woman in the US. (See the waist to hip ratio on bmicalculator.com if you don't believe this.)
> 
> The standards for being fat/obese seem insanely low to me. I don't think it's an accident that we value thinness and therefore think fatness is a "disease." Until a person is emaciated, we don't tend to see a problem. /rant
> 
> P.S. It's your fault for getting me started, Rainy.



Part of the whole reason for the "obesity epidemic" is that they changed the standards for "overweight" and "obese" some time ago. Several millions of people went to bed "normal" and woke up "overweight." Tell me how this makes sense?


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## NFA (Apr 29, 2006)

As long as success is measured by weight loss, any such program is going to have a very negative and harmful effect on those pressured into them. Doesn't matter if what comprises the program seems sensible and healthy (and organ amputation is most certainly neither). If you are teaching kids that their health is measured by their weight, you are teaching them that healthy activities that do not result in weight loss aren't worth doing. You are teaching them shame and self-hate. You are teaching them to feel guilt over living and this all will have a damaging effect. How many more decades will we keep lionizing the goal of weight loss while that goal continues to expand its record of abject failure and death? For the sake of our children we need to at long last work on eliminating weight obsessions and put the focus truly on health and well being in one's body, no matter how fat or thin that body might be and no matter how certain you are that your body should be something it isn't.


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## Miss Vickie (Apr 29, 2006)

crazygrad said:


> I wonder if for some families it isn't just about weight but about developing healthy habits?
> 
> A 240 pound teenager might be very inactive and consuming tons of junk food. A program might help to develop healthy habits so no matter what a person weighs he or she will be active and healthy.



I agree, to an extent. Programs like this can be helpful in that regard, but why not just teach that stuff BEFORE there's a problem. And I really don't think it's a lack of education that makes American families make poor choices so much as really good marketing on the part of the food manufacturers, and the convenience factor. Most families are so damn busy now, who's got time to cook? (This is one reason I taught my kids to cook early on and it's paid off. Today I came home and my 13 year old daughter was making herself an omlette).


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## rainyday (Apr 29, 2006)

TheSadeianLinguist said:


> IMHO, Rainy, the standards for compulsive over-eating are very low, purposefully, while the standard for diagnosed anorexia or bulemia is very, very high...The standards for being fat/obese seem insanely low to me. I don't think it's an accident that we value thinness and therefore think fatness is a "disease." Until a person is emaciated, we don't tend to see a problem. /rant
> 
> P.S. It's your fault for getting me started, Rainy.



Heh. I consider it a good thing. 

Actually, I could add to your rant here. When I finally decided to get help for my bulimia when I was in my late twenties I had trouble being taken seriously. I had been bulimic since I was fifteen (severely at some points, much less at others). The first few medical folks I confided in just kind of ignored what I had said. It was really amazing to me, especially since it had taken so long to be willing to talk about it. Finally after several tries I realized they were looking at my size and thinking I couldn't be purging or I'd be more successful at it--aka smaller. Fortunately after some searching I ended up with professionals who got it.

When I was looking for help, I also called a well-known residential ED treatment center. They didn't in any way tell me not to come, but they said that because my size was so much larger than the other patients I might not feel comfortable and that other patients might not feel comfortable with me. That was a little odd to hear too.


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## TheSadeianLinguist (Apr 29, 2006)

Moonvine: Absolutely. And these standards are NOT very high to be "overweight." Something that always puzzled me was people talking about fat hips. Hips are mostly bone and have relatively little padding no matter what, and seem to be set at a certain width. How the hell can anyone have fat hips? Never understood it.

And yep, Rainy, re: purging. It sort of stuns me that people are totally ignorant about bulimia, even "professionals." A lot of people just DO NOT realize that b/p doesn't really help you lose weight. It's so easy to slip under the radar, and I suspect a lot more people do it than ever admit it. I can think of a dozen of people around me who do not have diagnosed eating disorders who binge and purge.


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## Tina (Apr 30, 2006)

Honey, believe me, one can have fat hips. See here. It took me a long time to accept this -- into my early thirties. I have *always* had wide, very padded hips. Now I like it a lot, which might sound odd to some, but oh well. It is something distinctive about me, even though it makes finding pants difficult. 

You obviously have a lot of personal perspective on the subject of eating disorders and I think you are right on in what you say. The focus on weight equalling some sort of perfection and worthiness is *so* destructive.


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## TheSadeianLinguist (Apr 30, 2006)

Ohhh. See, perhaps that's where I'm confused. I always gained weight a little below the hip, but counted myself as a pear due to measurements. Most of the padding is a little below the hip. Women's bodies are amazing, aren't they? Most of the women here are narrower-hipped and apple-y, so it's hard to judge! Beautiful pic though!


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## Tina (Apr 30, 2006)

Thank you. So much of the distribution of fat is genetic. I have my mother's shape, though more extreme hips, I think. And of course, bone structure has something to do with it. You certainly could be a pear, but I don't really know, or pay attten to, what the 'requirements' are.


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## Sandie_Zitkus (May 1, 2006)

OK here I go again with all my useless info. definition of a PEAR shape - two thirds of your weight being carried below your waist. I am a pear - my mother is an apple as is my sister. My father's sisters are all pears.

ta da!


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## rainyday (May 1, 2006)

Sandie_Zitkus said:


> OK here I go again with all my useless info. definition of a PEAR shape - two thirds of your weight being carried below your waist. I am a pear - my mother is an apple as is my sister. My father's sisters are all pears.
> 
> ta da!



How does one cut their body in half to weigh the parts? 
Actually, maybe this is a question for Anta.


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