Obese children at risk of early puberty

This is an automatically translated article.

The article is professionally consulted by Dr., Doctor Bui Phuong Thao - Pediatric Center, Vinmec Times City International Hospital. He has more than 20 years of experience working in the field of Pediatrics. Her strength is in the diagnosis, treatment and care of infants and young children, examination and treatment of endocrinology.

Precocious puberty is a very worrying situation for children today, due to the effects on the physical and psychological development of children. Among the causes of early puberty, obesity is mentioned first.
Experts say that obesity in children is one of the causes of early puberty. A series of questions have been raised as to what scientific evidence proves this? What is the link between obesity and early puberty, and how does it affect children?

1. Why are obese children at risk of early puberty?

The first and most recognizable sign in puberty is breast development, which can last for a few years. Then there are signs such as menstruation in girls or voice changes in boys, acne appears in both sexes.
A child is considered precocious when it begins before the age of 8 for girls and 9 years of age for boys. Many scientific studies have shown that overweight and obese girls are more likely to have early puberty than underweight, anorexic girls. In the underweight group, it was found that they often went through puberty later than their peers.
Throughout the decades, it seems that the age of puberty in children has not changed. But in the past few decades, the trend of early puberty is increasingly becoming an alarming problem in child health care. In 1965, 5% of children aged 6-11 who were obese had precocious puberty, by 2000, this rate had increased to 12%.
However, scientific evidence has shown that obesity has no causal relationship with precocious puberty, but it is only a risk factor for early puberty in children, especially early puberty in children. girl .
Many medical professionals believe that sometimes doctors confuse obesity with precocious puberty because they have difficulty distinguishing between fat deposits in the breasts and breast tissue, if only on a clinical examination. Obese girls are more likely to be misdiagnosed.
According to medical studies, the reason for early puberty in children is due to a hormone - a hormone called leptin. Leptin secreted from fat cells, it plays an important role in the regulation of appetite and human reproductive function. Scientists have proven that, when a child has enough leptin in the body, that is when puberty begins. Therefore, overweight, obese girls with high leptin levels are more likely to have early puberty.
The biological changes of any human being are formed right from the fetal stage and through the effects of social life. The rapid weight gain of the mother during pregnancy is associated with obesity in the child and the child will be at risk of early puberty.

2. What should parents do when their children hit puberty early?

Obesity is not the only cause of early puberty in children. Endocrinologists believe that in addition to obesity, there are a number of factors that affect early puberty in children such as genetics, gender, race, social exposure, and even daily living environment. .
Exposure to cleaning chemicals in daily life is causing children to suffer consequences, for example, BPA in plastic changes hormones, which can cause children to reach puberty early.
So if your child has early puberty, parents should not be too worried but find ways to adapt and practice sports to protect their own health from an early age.
According to doctors, there is no way to treat precocious puberty in children, even weight loss (if the child is obese) has no effect. For children who have already gone through puberty when they lose weight, this pubertal process continues and does not stop.
Thus, prevention of precocious puberty in children needs to be done very early before the child reaches puberty by preventing childhood obesity. Parents need to help their children maintain the healthiest health to avoid early puberty by doing some of the following:
Encourage children to participate in regular physical activities, create exercise habits for children. young; Pay attention to the amount of calories in the child's meal, to ensure enough nutrients for the child to develop; Teach children how to eat healthy, choose foods rich in energy, high in fiber, vitamins, limit fat and processed foods; Limit the use of foods and utensils containing estrogen and testosterone. Parents should not let their children use creams, medicines, foods containing ingredients related to sex hormones.

For children with early puberty, parents should send their children to the doctor to receive advice from a doctor, to help adjust their lifestyle and activities to protect the healthy development of their children.
The early puberty screening package being implemented at Vinmec International General Hospital is the right choice of parents to have accurate conclusions about the health status and development of their children. Your baby will be examined with a leading specialist in Pediatric Endocrinology, will have sex hormone blood tests, bone age assessment tests, brain MRI scans or some more specialized tests to determine the right diagnosis. causes of precocious puberty and timely intervention.

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