Evolution of children and adolescents with excess body weight in outpatient care

Resumo

The objective of this study was to assess the evolution of anthropometric, blood pressure and laboratory tests of children and adolescents with excess body weight in the outpatient follow-up. This is a cohort study, conducted from May, 2013 to May, 2016, with 146 patients with excess body weight (57.5% male), from 2 to 19 years of age. The anthropometric, blood pressure and laboratorial variables were collected in the initial consultation and in the final evaluation in the hospital chart. On average, participants had 5.3 (± 3.4) visits during the study period. Increased weight, height and waist circumference were identified. However, the mean BMI z-score decreased significantly at the subsequent consultation, consequently increasing the prevalence of patients with overweight and decreasing the prevalence for those with severe obesity. There was a decrease in the systolic / diastolic blood pressure percentile, as well as the percentage of patients with abdominal circumference higher than the 90th percentile. The desirable levels of triglycerides, total cholesterol, LDL and HDL increased with significant differences (p<0.05) between the two evaluations, even though 47.4% of patients still maintained HDL below the desirable level. It was concluded that outpatient follow-up of children and adolescents with obesity and their families was positive. It also represented a growth in height and weight continuation with a decrease in BMI z-score and obesity, hypertension and levels of laboratory tests. In addition, the importance of specialized medical care and the need to evaluate service delivery are emphasized for more effective actions.