Child Obesity Can Cause Numerous Health And Emotional Problems

If you are concerned your child may be obese set an appointment with your family doctor for a screening and diagnosis. The doctor can calculate your child’s body mass index and determine where it falls on the national BMI-for-age growth chart. The BMI-for-age growth chart indicates if your child is overweight for his or her age and height. The doctor can determine your child’s percentile, which means how your child compares to other children of the same sex and age.

These growth charts are established by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and help to identify overweight children. If your child’s BMI-for-age is between 85th and 95th percentiles, he or she is at risk of being overweight. If your child’s BMI-for-age is over the 95th percentile, he or she is overweight.