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Childhood Obesity and COVID-19 Lockdown: Remarks on Eating Habits of Patients Enrolled in a Food-Education Program

Childhood obesity is a worldwide health emergency. In many cases, it is directly linked to inappropriate eating habits and a sedentary lifestyle. During lockdown aimed at containing the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) spread, children have been forced to stay at home. The present study aimed at inves...

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Autores principales: Nicodemo, Mirella, Spreghini, Maria Rita, Manco, Melania, Wietrzykowska Sforza, Rita, Morino, Giuseppe
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7911357/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33530570
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu13020383
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author Nicodemo, Mirella
Spreghini, Maria Rita
Manco, Melania
Wietrzykowska Sforza, Rita
Morino, Giuseppe
author_facet Nicodemo, Mirella
Spreghini, Maria Rita
Manco, Melania
Wietrzykowska Sforza, Rita
Morino, Giuseppe
author_sort Nicodemo, Mirella
collection PubMed
description Childhood obesity is a worldwide health emergency. In many cases, it is directly linked to inappropriate eating habits and a sedentary lifestyle. During lockdown aimed at containing the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) spread, children have been forced to stay at home. The present study aimed at investigating the lifestyles of outpatients (aged 5–17 years) with complicated obesity enrolled in the day-hospital food education program at the Children’s Hospital Bambino Gesù in Rome. A survey was performed based on a structured questionnaire, investigating dietary habits and lifestyles. The questionnaire answers were rated as “yes/no/sometimes” or “often/never/sometimes”. Eighty-eight families correctly completed the questionnaire between March and May 2020. The results highlighted that 85.2% (N = 75) of the patients ate breakfast regularly, and 64.3% (N = 72) consumed fruit as an afternoon snack. However, 21.6% (N = 19) did just “often” home workouts, and 50.0% (N = 44) reported an increase of feeling hungry with “sometimes” frequency. There is a significant relationship of feeling hungry with gender (p < 0.0001) and age (p = 0.048) and, also, between gender with having breakfast (p = 0.020) and cooking (p = 0.006). Living a healthy lifestyle during lockdown was difficult for the outpatients, mainly due to the increase in a sedentary lifestyle and the increase in feeling hungry, but some healthy eating habits were maintained, as advised during the food education program provided before lockdown.
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spelling pubmed-79113572021-02-28 Childhood Obesity and COVID-19 Lockdown: Remarks on Eating Habits of Patients Enrolled in a Food-Education Program Nicodemo, Mirella Spreghini, Maria Rita Manco, Melania Wietrzykowska Sforza, Rita Morino, Giuseppe Nutrients Article Childhood obesity is a worldwide health emergency. In many cases, it is directly linked to inappropriate eating habits and a sedentary lifestyle. During lockdown aimed at containing the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) spread, children have been forced to stay at home. The present study aimed at investigating the lifestyles of outpatients (aged 5–17 years) with complicated obesity enrolled in the day-hospital food education program at the Children’s Hospital Bambino Gesù in Rome. A survey was performed based on a structured questionnaire, investigating dietary habits and lifestyles. The questionnaire answers were rated as “yes/no/sometimes” or “often/never/sometimes”. Eighty-eight families correctly completed the questionnaire between March and May 2020. The results highlighted that 85.2% (N = 75) of the patients ate breakfast regularly, and 64.3% (N = 72) consumed fruit as an afternoon snack. However, 21.6% (N = 19) did just “often” home workouts, and 50.0% (N = 44) reported an increase of feeling hungry with “sometimes” frequency. There is a significant relationship of feeling hungry with gender (p < 0.0001) and age (p = 0.048) and, also, between gender with having breakfast (p = 0.020) and cooking (p = 0.006). Living a healthy lifestyle during lockdown was difficult for the outpatients, mainly due to the increase in a sedentary lifestyle and the increase in feeling hungry, but some healthy eating habits were maintained, as advised during the food education program provided before lockdown. MDPI 2021-01-26 /pmc/articles/PMC7911357/ /pubmed/33530570 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu13020383 Text en © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Nicodemo, Mirella
Spreghini, Maria Rita
Manco, Melania
Wietrzykowska Sforza, Rita
Morino, Giuseppe
Childhood Obesity and COVID-19 Lockdown: Remarks on Eating Habits of Patients Enrolled in a Food-Education Program
title Childhood Obesity and COVID-19 Lockdown: Remarks on Eating Habits of Patients Enrolled in a Food-Education Program
title_full Childhood Obesity and COVID-19 Lockdown: Remarks on Eating Habits of Patients Enrolled in a Food-Education Program
title_fullStr Childhood Obesity and COVID-19 Lockdown: Remarks on Eating Habits of Patients Enrolled in a Food-Education Program
title_full_unstemmed Childhood Obesity and COVID-19 Lockdown: Remarks on Eating Habits of Patients Enrolled in a Food-Education Program
title_short Childhood Obesity and COVID-19 Lockdown: Remarks on Eating Habits of Patients Enrolled in a Food-Education Program
title_sort childhood obesity and covid-19 lockdown: remarks on eating habits of patients enrolled in a food-education program
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7911357/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33530570
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu13020383
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