Obesity programs

Children’s Memorial Hospital, its medical staff, and its community partners work together to foster improved obesity prevention and management through a variety of efforts. These relate to one another through the Center on Obesity Management and Prevention (COMP). COMP offers seminars on obesity (odd months September to May) and journal clubs (even months October to June), and provides information sharing to participating Children's Memorial faculty and staff. Other aspects of obesity work at Children’s include the following:

Children's Memorial-affiliated primary care pediatric practices

Affiliated primary care pediatric practices address growth, nutrition, physical activity, and obesity prevention and management in the course of routine care of children and adolescents. Some practices are working with Children’s Pediatric Practice Research Group (PPRG) to systematically apply current guidelines for obesity detection and management. These guidelines were developed in collaboration with the Clinical Practices Working Group of the Children’s based Consortium to Lower Obesity in Chicago Children (CLOCC, see below).

Nutrition Evaluation Clinic (NEC)

Children under 12 years of age with established obesity are evaluated in the Nutrition Evaluation Clinic (NEC) by a team that includes physicians, dieticians, physical therapists and a social worker. Patients seen in NEC are managed in collaboration with the patients’ primary care physicians. NEC meets twice a week. Older children are seen for nutrition consultation only in Clinical Dietetics.

Specialty clinics treat a variety of weight-related conditions 

The hospital's specialty clinics treat overweight and obese children for varied weight-related conditions. These include, for example, fatty liver (treated by the Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, obstructive sleep apnea (treated by the sleep disorders section within Pulmonary Medicine, hypertension (treated in  Kidney Diseases, type 2 diabetes mellitus (treated in Endocrinology), asthma (treated in Allergy and Immunology), arthritis (treated by Rheumatology), and orthopedic problems (e.g., Blount disease, treated by Orthopaedics).

Community-based obesity prevention

Community-based obesity prevention is the focus of the nationally recognized Consortium to Lower Obesity in Chicago Children (CLOCC), based at Children’s Memorial. CLOCC fosters and facilitates connections between researchers; public health advocates and practitioners; corporations; policymakers; and children, families, and communities, to promote healthy and active lifestyles for children throughout the Chicago metropolitan area. CLOCC’s work includes over 700 organizations and over 1700 individuals, all involved in some aspect of child obesity prevention.

CLOCC works through eight working groups (including ones on clinical care, school systems, early childhood, and policy) and community level work in ten Chicago Community Areas. CLOCC has worked with its many partners on City and State policy development related to childhood obesity prevention. CLOCC is funded by philanthropy, its Corporate Advisory Committee and other sources.

Research on childhood obesity

Research on childhood obesity is led by investigators based at Children's Memorial and others based in the Children’s Memorial Research Center. Topics include fatty liver and diet in mice, acanthosis nigricans and insulin resistance in youth, variations in clinical phenotypes and co-morbidities in obese children, the epidemiology of metabolic syndrome, the relationships between metabolic syndrome and sleep and osteoporosis, primary care practice systems related to obesity prevention and care, the prevalence of obese children in families of adult bariatric surgery patients, community influences on child physical activity, BMI and lifestyle change in children attending a charter school that focuses on healthy lifestyle promotion, and physical activity levels of children attending park district programs and museums.

Recent projects have been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Active Living Research Program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and other sources. Learn more about the details here.