How Does Obesity Affect Your Body?

Obesity occurs when a person's body mass index is 30 or more. The main symptom is excess body fat, which increases the risk of serious health problems.

Obesity

can lead to deterioration of bone density and muscle mass. This is called osteosarcopenic obesity.

Osteosarcopenic obesity can lead to increased risk of fractures, physical disability, insulin resistance and poorer overall health outcomes. Obesity occurs when body weight is higher than normal. Obesity is a disease that can cause a lot of damage to the body. People who are severely obese are more prone to other diseases.

These include type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, heart disease, sleep apnoea and many more. Combined with obesity, these diseases can lead to poor health. In some cases, they can lead to poor quality of life, disability or premature death. Heart disease kills an estimated 600,000 people each year in the United States.

The American Heart Association considers obesity to be a major cause of heart disease. Large studies show that the risk of heart disease increases with obesity (. People with severe obesity have an increased risk of heart attack. People with obesity have reduced breathing capacity.

They are not able to breathe in and out as much air. These people have an increased risk of respiratory (lung) infections, asthma and other respiratory disorders. Asthma has been shown to be three to four times more common among people with obesity (see Figure 1). For people with severe obesity, the mortality rate increases for all types of cancer.

The mortality rate is 52% higher in men and 62% higher in women (. Obesity puts a strain on the entire circulatory system, which transports blood through the body via the vessels (arteries and veins). This strain increases the risk of stroke and damage to the vessels of the brain. Obesity can lead to other risk factors for stroke.

Risk factors for stroke include heart disease, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, type 2 diabetes (called metabolic syndrome when someone has three or more of these conditions) and obstructive sleep apnoea (obstructive sleep apnoea). Obesity has been associated with an increased risk of GERD, inflammation of the oesophagus and, in rare cases, oesophageal cancer (1). Excess weight, especially obesity, decreases almost every aspect of health, from reproductive and respiratory function to memory and mood. Obesity increases the risk of a number of debilitating and deadly diseases, including diabetes, heart disease and some cancers.

It does so through a number of pathways, some as simple as the mechanical stress of carrying the extra pounds and others involving complex changes in hormones and metabolism. Obesity decreases the quality and length of life, and increases individual, national and global health costs. However, the good news is that weight loss can reduce some obesity-related risks. Losing as little as 5-10 per cent of body weight offers significant health benefits for obese people, even if they never reach their "ideal weight, and even if they only begin to lose weight later in life.

The term obese describes a person who is very overweight, with a lot of body fat. Kidney disease means that the kidneys are damaged and cannot filter the blood as they should. Obesity increases the risk of diabetes and high blood pressure, which are the most common causes of kidney disease. Even if you don't have diabetes or high blood pressure, obesity can promote kidney disease and accelerate its progression.

Obesity - and the diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and inflammation that come with it - can wear down arteries, making them thick and stiff. Researchers are studying whether cognitive behavioural therapies can be an effective treatment for overweight and obesity by retraining the brain not to associate pleasure with food and the act of eating. It is very important to take action to tackle obesity because, in addition to causing obvious physical changes, it can lead to a number of serious and potentially life-threatening diseases. However, BMI does not directly measure body fat, so some people, such as muscular athletes, may have a BMI in the obese category even though they do not have excess body fat.

Obesity can cause a number of additional problems, such as difficulties in everyday activities and serious health problems. During pregnancy, obesity increases the risk of early and late miscarriage, gestational diabetes, pre-eclampsia and complications during childbirth. Preventing obesity, starting at an early age and extending throughout life, could greatly improve individual and public health, reduce suffering and save billions of dollars each year in healthcare costs. However, determining the contribution of obesity to premature mortality has been fraught with methodological problems and controversy.

If your BMI indicates that you are approaching overweight, or if you have certain risk factors, your doctor may recommend that you adopt healthy lifestyle changes to prevent you from becoming obese. When these patients develop certain obesity-related complications, they may be candidates for the following surgeries. In some people, obesity may be due to a medical cause, such as Prader-Willi syndrome, Cushing's syndrome and other conditions. A subsequent systematic review and meta-analysis confirmed direct associations between obesity and cancers of the breast, colon and rectum, endometrium, oesophagus, kidney, ovary and pancreas.