ESPE Abstracts

Introduction: Obesity in childhood and adolescence is a major problem with many adverse consequences in public health due to its increasing prevalence, as well as the burden on the health system. Recently, the need to find effective intervention and prevention strategies for the management of obesity has led to the development of e-health technologies, which record behavioral data objectively and correlate them with factors that increase body mass index (BMI).

Objective: To determine the dietary and exercise habits of children and adolescents at the beginning of their participation in the study ‘BigO: Big Data against Childhood Obesity’ (http://bigoprogram.eu, Horizon2020, No. 727688).

Methods: Nine hundred (n=900) children and adolescents aged 8-18 years who attended the Out-patient Clinic for the Prevention and Management of Overweight and Obesity in Childhood and Adolescence participated in this cross-sectional study. Medical history and anthropometric measurements were obtained by a single trained observer and participants were clinically evaluated by a multidisciplinary management team. The data collection system included the BigO technology platform, which interfaces with a Smartphone and Smartwatch, and records data on diet, sleep and exercise objectively for each patient. Children’s caregivers were asked to complete the self-administered food frequency questionnaire for children “ToyBox” and a physical activity questionnaire. The statistical analysis was carried out by the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software program.

Results: The study sample consisted of 900 children and adolescents of which 73,1% were obese, 24,7% overweight and 2,2% had normal BMI. A higher number of boys had obesity (76,3%/69,7%, P-value:0.031), while a higher number of girls were overweight (28.5%/21.1%, P-value:0.031). According to the descriptive data, the consumption of cereal without sugar and no added sugar was higher in all BMI categories than those with addition of sugar (P-value:0.025), although children with obesity tended to consume higher proportions of cereal than those with overweight and normal BMI (P-value: 0.041). In all BMI categories, participants had large proportions of meat and poultry (P-value:0.031) while the consumption of potatoes was more frequent in obese than overweight children (P-value:0.029). Boys, consumed larger amount of water, light beverages, vegetables, meat, fried potatoes and chocolate spread than girls (P-value:<0,05). In both sexes, participants who never watched television during meals were more than those who watched (P-value:<0.05).

Conclusion: Monitoring the nutrition and physical activity in childhood and adolescence may lead to the development of evidence-based guidelines for the prevention and treatment of childhood obesity.