The Association of Overweight and Ankle Injuries in Children

Abstract

OBJECTIVES-Overweight children are at increased risk for many medical problems. Trauma is the leading etiology of childhood morbidity and mortality. No previous study has evaluated the association between overweight and acute ankle injuries in children. We hypothesized that being overweight is associated with an increased risk of ankle injury in children.METHODS-We conducted a case-control study in an urban pediatric emergency department. Subjects aged 5 to 19 years were recruited from June 2005 through July 2006. Children with acute ankle trauma were enrolled as cases. A convenience sample of children with a chief complaint of fever, headache, or sore throat was enrolled as controls. Demographic information and anthropometric measurements were obtained. Age-and gender-specific body mass index percentiles (BMI-Ps) were calculated using pediatric norms.Multivariate unconditional logistic regression was used to assess the relationship between overweight and ankle injury, adjusting for demographic variables. Through medical records, we obtained demographic information and weight, but not height, of all cases who were not enrolled. This allowed us to conduct a sensitivity analysis in which we combined the enrolled and non-enrolled cases into a single case group and made increasingly more unlikely assumptions about the height percentiles of the non-enrolled cases.RESULTS-There were 180 cases and 180 controls enrolled in the study. We observed a significant association between overweight and ankle injury (multivariate-adjusted OR: 3.26; 95% CI: 1.86-5.72; P value for trend <.0001). Although this result may be an overestimate of the magnitude of the association due to a possible bias in the selection of cases, sensitivity analysis demonstrated the robustness of the statistical significance of the finding.CONCLUSIONS-Overweight children may be at increased risk of ankle injury.

Childhood Obesity Is Associated With Increased Risk of Most Lower Extremity Fractures

“…That study did not, however, assess the association between BMI and the specific fracture locations in the lower extremities. Lower extremity fractures account for between 15% and 22% of long bone fractures in large-scale studies of pediatric fractures [5,21,22,41].…”

Association between obesity and injury among Taiwanese adults

“…[3][4][5] Some studies have identified an increased risk of injury among young overweight and obese groups of people. 6,7 Other research, from cross-sectional studies, has shown that increased body weight is associated with an increased risk of unintentional injury 8,9 and with workplace traumatic injury. 10,11 Past studies that have investigated the relationship between obesity and injury have been limited to mostly western populations, by the use of a specific subgroup of persons, or by the use of a cross-sectional study approach.…”

Alterações ortopédicas em crianças e adolescentes obesos

“…Klenerman (28) e Zonfrillo et al (29) atentam ainda ao fato de que as crianças podem ser mais facilmente lesionadas durante atividades esportivas do que indivíduos com maturação esquelética completa, pois seus ossos são mais porosos e frágeis, por causa das epífises de crescimento. Dessa forma, Calvete (11) complementa que, no exercício físico desenvolvido para jovens obesos, é importante considerar o peso corporal desses indivíduos como uma sobrecarga durante o esforço físico.…”