Sunday, February 8, 2015

How to Keep Your Child From Being Overweight

2. Don't be that parent (or the other one, either).
At one end of the extreme, there's the tuned-out parent. At the other end, there's the overzealous parent. Neither seems to help when it comes to kids' weight and food.

Madsen recently evaluated the effect of notices mailed to some parents of public school children in California who had higher than average BMIs (body mass indexes).

Her research, published in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine in 2011, found that years after parents were notified, children were no more likely to have lost weight than children whose parents weren't notified.

"Basically, notifying these parents had no effect," she says, noting that some of the parents probably never opened the letter, didn't understand BMI or simply didn't know what steps to take.

On the other hand, there are parents who advocate for measures such as banning birthday cakes and chocolate milk in school.

"I appreciate the thought behind not wanting to associate reward and food," Madsen says. "But, in general, it works better to promote things that are healthy rather than ban things that aren't."

Parenting-wise, the sweet – as in, healthy – spot is in the middle: Don't stick your head in the sand or become the food police. To reduce the chances of having overweight children, do encourage and model healthy eating and physical activity.

"Physical activity is extremely effective and, tragically, it's our most underutilized health tool," Madsen says.