Weight-loss camp can work for kids: study

By Amy Norton

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Overweight children can get in
shape by spending part of their summer at a weight-loss camp,
if the experience of one such program is any indication.

UK researchers found that children who attended the
northern England camp for about a month lost an average of 13
pounds, improved their fitness level and sports skill, and in
general felt better about themselves.

With so little known about what works for childhood weight
loss, the new findings offer some evidence that weight-loss
camps can indeed work, according to the study authors.

They caution, however, that the success of one program does
not mean that others will be effective.

“There is definitely variance in the quality” of different
programs, said Dr. Paul J. Gately of Leeds Metropolitan
University, the study’s lead author.

The program in this study, Gately told Reuters Health, was
carefully developed over seven years and employed a “truly
holistic” approach that integrated diet, exercise and lifestyle
changes.

Still, he said, the results point to the potential for
weight-loss camps to work.

The study, published in the journal Pediatrics, followed
185 overweight and obese children who attended the weight-loss
camp at some point between 1999 and 2002. They each spent about
a month, on average, in the program.

Gately and his colleagues compared the children with a
group of normal-weight and overweight kids who went about their
usual summertime routines.

Campers spent their days playing sports, swimming, canoeing
and taking part in other structured activities meant to boost
their fitness and help them enjoy being active. The children’s
calorie intake was moderately limited, and they had classes on
how to make healthy food choices, keep up lifestyle changes and
deal with bullying.

Overall, the researchers found, children at the camp shed
an average of 13 pounds and reduced their body mass index — a
measure of weight in relation to height — mainly through
losing body fat. In contrast, overweight and normal-weight
children in the comparison group tended to gain body fat.

Treadmill exercise tests showed that the campers’ aerobic
fitness and blood pressure had improved by the end of the
program, as had their skills in sports like basketball and
soccer. The children also showed gains in self-esteem, as
measured by questionnaires.

According to the researchers, the camp environment may have
allowed the children to overcome body-related or social
barriers that may have kept them from being active.

“Overall,” they write, “providing a controlled but safe,
enjoyable and social environment is a likely a major
contributor” to the changes in weight, fitness and self-esteem
the children showed.

SOURCE: Pediatrics, July 2005.