Characterizing Obesity Interventions and Treatment for Children and Youths During 1991-2018

Area of Science:

• Public Health
• Pediatrics
• Health Policy

Background:

• Overweight and obesity are global health crises, increasing morbidity and mortality.
• Current treatments include lifestyle changes, medication, and surgery.
• Limited understanding exists regarding research trends in childhood obesity interventions.

Purpose of the Study:

• To analyze the research landscape, topics, and trends of interventions for childhood overweight and obesity.
• To identify research productivity and workflow in this field from 1991 to 2018.

Main Methods:

• Bibliometric analysis of 20,925 publications from the Web of Science database (1991-2018).
• Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) used for topic identification.
• Dendrogram analysis employed for research discipline categorization.

Main Results:

• A significant increase in publications on multilevel interventions (family-based, school-based, community-based) was observed.
• Research output on interventions for children and adolescents with overweight/obesity is disproportionately low in low-resource settings.
• This contrasts with the rising prevalence of youth overweight and obesity in these regions due to cultural and nutritional shifts.

Conclusions:

• Multilevel interventions are a growing focus in childhood obesity research.
• There is an urgent need for increased support from developed nations to address the global rise in childhood overweight and obesity, particularly in underserved regions.
• Further research and targeted interventions are crucial for mitigating the health and societal burden of pediatric obesity.