Underweight and Overweight Children

Abstract

Normal body weight and adequate weight gain are two of the most important signs of good health. However, it is important to realise that although they may be closely related, it is not uncommon to find small, ‘light’ children who gain weight appropriately. In general terms, while weight gain may be said to be affecting present health status overall, body weight is governed by more long-term factors. Body weight can be closely linked to height (which itself is determined by parental, constitutional and genetic factors) and to a lesser extent, nutrition. So in any random group of children of similar age you will naturally find a wide variation in height, size and weight, with a number of children apparently ‘small’ for their age. This latter group can easily be identified in almost any class of children and they are often ‘picked on’ or made fun of by the other children because of their small stature. (See BULLING.) Usually these children are constitutionally small, and they grow and gain weight at a rate appropriate to their size; they can be considered as normal in every other sense. This is the commonest cause of ‘small stature’ that is referred for medical opinion. True dwarfism is very rare, and may be caused by a small number of skeletal, hormonal and chromosomal abnormalities, all of which may need skilled investigation for detection.