Healthful
Habits Should Start In Childhood
New
Guidelines Outline Ways To Encourage Healthiest Behaviors
When
should people start taking the steps necessary to ward off heart disease?
Try childhood.
So says the American
Heart Association (AHA), which has just released a comprehensive
summary of heart disease prevention guidelines for pediatricians to
use with their patients.
"Many studies
have shown an association between atherosclerosis and high cholesterol,
and high blood pressure and obesity, beginning in children as young
as 5 years old," says Dr. Rae-Ellen Kavey, lead author of the guidelines.
Guidelines
Underscore Need
But while guidelines
have existed for preventive care for adults at risk for heart disease,
there were no similar, overall guidelines for children, adds Dr. Kavey,
who is chair of cardiology at Children's Memorial Hospital, Northwestern
University in Chicago.
"There are pre-existing guidelines for children
about cholesterol, blood pressure, and weight, and now we have put all
the information together into one place for pediatricians - it is aimed
at primary-care providers," Dr. Kavey says.
Preventing heart disease cannot begin too early, she
says. The guidelines reflect the latest information that suggests that
early intervention in adopting a healthy lifestyle can be enormously
effective in delaying the onset of heart disease.
For otherwise healthy children and teens, the guidelines
suggest regularly assessing a child's heart health by checking weight,
blood pressure, and lipid levels, if necessary.
The guidelines also ask physicians to recommend healthy
food choices, such as eating more fruits and vegetables, to restrict
intake of saturated fats to less than 10 percent of a child's daily
caloric consumption, and to keep sugar intake low.
Prevention
Is Key
The guidelines
also emphasize the importance of daily physical activity and limiting
sedentary activity. For instance, no more than two hours of television
or sitting at a computer each day. The dangers of smoking are also discussed.
The second part of the guidelines identifies those children
or teens already at high risk for cardiovascular disease. These include
children with a Body Mass Index (BMI) above the 85th percentile for
their age, height, and weight; a blood pressure reading in the 90th
percentile for age, sex, and height; and a cholesterol reading of 170
or higher.
Other factors that put children at higher risk is a
family history of heart disease, particularly if male relatives had
heart disease before age 55 and female relatives before age 65.
Finally, the guidelines recommend treatments for those
children already at risk for heart disease, including dietary changes
such as lowering salt intake, losing weight, or prescribing medications
if needed.
"Parents have major questions about food, when
to start solids, what are good snacks, which kinds of formula, so the
doctors are giving advice about diet," she says. "With these
guidelines, they have an opportunity to give specific information about
low-fat diets at the get-go."
"It's much easier to establish healthy eating and
physical activity patterns than to change unhealthy patterns,"
she adds.
Always consult your child's physician for more information.
Online
Resources
American
Diabetes Association
American
Heart Association
Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
Diabetes
Care
Healthier
US.Gov
National
Diabetes Education Program
National
Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI)
National
Institute of Diabetes & Digestive & Kidney Diseases (NIDDKD)
National
Institutes of Health (NIH)
New
England Journal of Medicine
|
July 2003
In
This Issue:
Healthful
Habits Start With Children
Guidelines
Underscore Need
Prevention
Is Key
Dealing
with Anger, for Health's Sake
Online
Resources
Other
Resources:
Find
a St. John's Mercy Physician
Children's
Services at St. John's Mercy
Children's
Health Information
St.
John's Mercy Classes and Programs
Dealing
with Anger, for Health's Sake
New findings show that hostile children may end up aggravating their
health, researchers report.
The study by University of Pittsburgh
and University of Helsinki researchers found children and adolescents
who respond with anger to life events have a greater risk of developing
metabolic syndrome, a precursor to heart disease.
Indications of metabolic syndrome include
high blood pressure, weight gain, insulin resistance, and elevated
cholesterol levels.
The researchers examined hostility
levels and cardiovascular risk in 134 American children aged 8 to
10 and 15 to 17. They found children who had high scores on hostility
tests were more likely to exhibit metabolic syndrome three years
later than children who did not have high hostility scores.
Obesity and insulin resistance were
the two highest risk factors found in hostile children in the follow-up,
the study says.
Unhealthy
lifestyles such as physical inactivity, poor diet, and smoking and
alcohol use can be a way that hostile children and adolescents cope,
behavior that can contribute to development of metabolic syndrome,
the authors suggest in the journal Health Psychology.
The authors say the study findings
could be used to evaluate youngsters' behavioral risk to developing
these potential health problems.
"There is a need for interventions
designed to reduce hostility in young people to prevent the precursors
to cardiovascular disease, like obesity or type 2 diabetes, which
has become a huge health problem in children in the US," says
Dr. Karen A. Matthews.
Always consult your child's physician
for more information.
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