Children with Multiple Sclerosis Face Higher Risk of Obesity

Published June 29, 2011 This content is archived.

Researchers at UB have identified obesity as an additional health problem for children—especially boys—with multiple sclerosis and other demyelinating disorders.

“Increasing rates of childhood obesity have been reported widely in the media . . . but no information has been available on the relationship between obesity and childhood- onset demyelina- ting disorders. ”
E. Ann Yeh, MD
pediatric MS specialist and assistant professor of neurology
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Boys were twice as likely as girls to have a body mass index (BMI) in the 95th percentile or greater, they found.

Study Raises New Questions about MS and Obesity

“The findings underscore the need for attention to the nutritional and physical needs of children with these disorders,” says pediatric MS specialist E. Ann Yeh, MD, assistant professor of neurology and the study’s first author.

Although obesity has been linked to heart disease and diabetes, among other illnesses, little is known about its relationship to demyelinating disorders.

“Increasing rates of childhood obesity have been reported widely in the media and in medical journals,” says Yeh, “but no information has been available on the relationship between obesity and childhood-onset demyelinating disorders.”

“Comprehensive programs oriented toward the prevention of obesity in all children are needed, but we also need further studies to help define the relationship between obesity and risk for demyelinating disorders.”

One of First Studies to Measure Obesity in Pediatric MS

The study involved patients in UB’s Pediatric MS and Demyelinating Disorders Center of Excellence, located in Women and Children’s Hospital of Buffalo.

Data were collected prospectively between January 2003 and October 2010 in patients under the age of 18.

The findings build on a study by other researchers showing an association between obesity in adolescence and MS in adulthood, but this appears to be the first study to evaluate obesity in relation to pediatric demyelinating disorders.

Study Was the Result of Collaboration

Murali Ramanathan, PhD, professor of pharmaceutical sciences and neurology, and Bianca Weinstock-Guttman, PhD, associate professor of neurology, both associated with the Pediatric MS and Demyelinating Disorders Center of Excellence, also contributed to the research.