Weight loss plan boosts kids' grades, self-image: researchers report

Jet, Sept 12, 1994

A strict diet combined with exercise and behavior changes slashed the pounds from overweight children and teens and improved their grades, social lives and self-esteem, researchers report.

The weight loss program addresses one of the most important and most widely overlooked health problems in children, said Dr. Robert Suskind, a pediatrician at Louisiana State University, during the 7th annual International Congress on Obesity in Toronto.

Surveys show at least one-fourth of U.S. children are 20 percent or more above their ideal weights, Suskind said. In his research, Suskind combined a very restrictive diet of 600 to 800 calories per day for up to 30 weeks followed by a 1,200-calorie diet for the rest of the year-long program. A graduated exercise program and behavior modification techniques to encourage eating more slowly and not eating between meals were also used, Suskind said.