I don't think that there is a debate over the most common cause of obesity today wink) Another cause of childhood obesity is overzealous mothers who have the access to food, overeat during pregnancy ( mostly carbs ) and that results in a very chubby / heavy newborn ( mostly fat )...no advantage, i say...infact their gross motor milestones will be delayed, becos they have to develop a lot of strength in their postural muscles to defy gravity and to be able tosit up, crawl, walk etc. But what do we instinctively say, when we see a 3.5 - 4 kg baby...ohhhh very healthy child...and the problem is compounded by overfeeding the child during infancy ( starting with early weaning ) But the child in the Spot Diagnosis seems to have a humble back ground...so may be it's a child born to a diabetic mother and then carried on from there. or may be a genetic problem like - 1) leptin resistance and leptin deficiency [Broken External Image]:http://www.endotext.org/obesity/obesity8/figures8/figure1.jpg Response to leptin therapy in Congenital leptin deficiency 2) I don't think this is Prader-willi becos the child seems to have sufficient tone as he is able to stand erect with all that weight. 3) Albright hereditary osteodystrophy (AHO) 4) Bardet-Biedl syndrome (BBS) 5) Alstrom syndrome ( very very rare ) or a CNS tumor causing lesion to the satiety center - Adiposogenital dystrophy ( Frohlich syndrome ) or an endocrine issue 1) i don't think this child looks like a cretin ( by any stretch of imagination )...so hypothyroidism is also unlikely 2) got to rule out an ACTH secreting tumor ( although the obesity in this case is not cushingoid ) (-:
