Obesity News and Research

Latest Obesity News and Research

Women with history of childhood physical abuse are more likely to become obese

Women with a history of childhood physical abuse are more likely to become obese adults, according to a new study by University of Toronto researchers.

14 Aug 2013

Regular exercise can give significant mental boost for HIV infected adults

Regular exercise is not only good for health, but can give people living with HIV a significant mental boost. This is according to a study by Dr. David J. Moore and colleagues at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), published in Springer's Journal of NeuroVirology.

14 Aug 2013

Researchers discover why early pregnancy reduces breast cancer

An international scientific collaborative led by the Harvard Stem Cell Institute's Kornelia Polyak, MD, PhD, has discovered why women who give birth in their early twenties are less likely to eventually develop breast cancer than women who don't, triggering a search for a way to confer this protective state on all women.

13 Aug 2013

Student explores how truck drivers react to marketplace demands for flexibility, speed

Benjamin Snyder conducted his research in the cab of a truck hauling frozen chicken from Missouri to Virginia. Snyder, a graduate sociology student in the University of Virginia's Graduate School of Arts & Sciences, will present his paper, "The Professionalized Body: Truck Driving in the Age of Flexibilization," at the 108th Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association.

13 Aug 2013

BMI can be sole measure to evaluate interventions for child obesity

Body mass index (BMI) or a change in BMI is often the sole measure used to evaluate whether an intervention intended to combat childhood obesity is effective. But a new study clearly shows that an intervention can have beneficial effects on other health outcomes, such as cardiovascular fitness, regardless of its effect on BMI.

13 Aug 2013

Researchers say type 2 diabetes status should be taken into account in future BMI-mortality studies

The relationship between body mass index (BMI) appears to be stronger in adults without diabetes than those with existing diabetes. These findings- are published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine- in a study by Chandra Jackson of the Harvard School of Public Health and colleagues.

13 Aug 2013

School lunch consumption and TV viewing associated with childhood obesity

Among middle-school children, the behaviors most often linked with obesity are school lunch consumption and two hours or more of daily TV viewing, according to a new look at the dramatic increase in childhood obesity.

13 Aug 2013

Breastfeeding linked with decreased risk of obesity among kids in Japan

Breastfeeding appears to be associated with decreased risk of overweight and obesity among school children in Japan, according to a study by Michiyo Yamakawa, M.H.Sc., of the Okayama University Graduate School of Medicine, Dentistry, and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Okayama City, Japan, and colleagues.

13 Aug 2013

Parents effort improves healthy behaviors of their children at schools

Because children spend most of their time in classrooms, schools are an ideal setting for healthy behaviors to be taught and modeled. Therefore, parents are speaking up and getting involved in an effort to improve the health of their children at schools.

12 Aug 2013

Weight and mortality relationship appears to be stronger in adults without diabetes

Researchers ask diabetes status be taken into account in population studies that link weight and mortality. The relationship between body mass index (BMI) appears to be stronger in adults without diabetes than those with existing diabetes. These findings¹ are published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine² in a study by Chandra Jackson of the Harvard School of Public Health and colleagues.

12 Aug 2013

Children who exhibit lower conscientiousness may have adult obesity

Results from a longitudinal study show that children who exhibit lower conscientiousness (e.g., irresponsible, careless, not persevering) could experience worse overall health, including greater obesity, as adults.

12 Aug 2013

Viewpoints: Fears of health law's adverse selection; GOP's 'fundamental miscalculation;' special deal for Congress keeps dissent low

Yet despite the care the administration took in establishing incentives and safeguards, even some of Obamacare's most committed backers are wondering whether the experiment will work as advertised - or, like Harvard's P.P.O., go off the rails along the way. Adverse selection is perhaps the direst threat. ... Healthier Americans will probably flock to cheaper bronze plans. And insurers will vie to enroll the healthy. In some states, big insurers have chosen not to participate in exchanges to avoid their strictures. On the outside, they could still sell cheap plans to skim off the healthy and avoid a rule that insurers on the exchanges must also offer more generous silver and gold plans (Eduardo Porter, 8/7).

9 Aug 2013

ProMedica and Cleveland Clinic collaborate to develop health system affiliation

ProMedica and Cleveland Clinic have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to develop a health system affiliation that will better position both organizations to anticipate and proactively respond to the evolving healthcare landscape.

9 Aug 2013

KU researchers receives grant to create new program to help American Indian students stop smoking

The University of Kansas Cancer Center's Cancer Control and Population Health program got a boost in April when Won Choi, Ph.D., and his colleagues were awarded a $2.7 million, five-year NCI grant to create an Internet-based program to help American Indian tribal college students stop smoking.

8 Aug 2013

Viewpoints: Obamacare isn't a 'job-killing' law; hometown insurer Aetna pulls out of Conn. exchange

The share of part-time jobs rose sharply during the recession, as it always does - employers always cut workers' hours in downturns. Here's the question: Has this share continued to grow as we approach the start of the ACA's employer mandate, which was recently pushed back a year to 2015? The answer is no. Part-time workers represent 19.0 percent of total employment - below the post-recession peak of 20.0 percent and exactly the same as a year ago (Jared Bernstein and Paul Van de Water, 8/6).

8 Aug 2013

CDC: Some states report decreasing rates of childhood obesity

Small but significant declines in obesity among low-income preschoolers were found in 18 states and the U.S. Virgin Islands from 2008 to 2011.

8 Aug 2013

Endovascular Therapy still "reasonable" option for patients with acute stroke

Despite recent discouraging results, endovascular treatment is still a "reasonable" treatment option for selected patients with acute stroke, according to a commentary in the August issue of Neurosurgery, official journal of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.

8 Aug 2013