Exercise intervention and cardiovascular risk factors in obese children. Comparison between obese youngsters taking part in a physical activity school-based programme with and without individualised diet counselling: the ACORDA project

Abstract

Aim: To determine the effects of a school-based exercise intervention programme on cardiovascular risk factors, including body fat (BF), metabolic profile and physical activity (PA) in children with and without individualised dietary counselling approach (IDC and WIDC).

Subjects and methods: Forty-six overweight children from 6–16 years old (25 girls, 54.3%; age = 10.3 ± 2.8) of six schools took part in an 8-month interdisciplinary, school-based intervention programme. All children were engaged in PA classes, but only one group was exposed to individualised counselling. Blood pressure (BP), lipids and lipoproteins, accelerometer-based PA, percentage of body fat (%BF) and trunk fat (%TF) measures were taken before and after intervention. General Linear Model (Repeated Measures ANOVA) adjusted for age, maturation and height change was used to analyse the longitudinal effect of individualised counselling between two evaluations in each group.

Results: Favourable changes were observed for %BF, %TF, systolic BP and total cholesterol in the IDC group. Subjects WIDC only increased light and moderate–vigorous PA. In IDC, significant effects for time * group interactions were found for systolic BP, total cholesterol and LDL-cholesterol, indicating that counselling might add favourable changes in these markers, beyond those explained by PA and growth.

Conclusion: School-based interventions can contribute to counteracting obesity in youth, particularly when individualised dietary counselling is provided. Therefore, the link between schools and professional counselling should be strengthened to ensure consolidated changes towards healthy behaviours.

• Children and adolescents
• diet counselling
• dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry
• obesity
• physical activity

Acknowledgements

This study was supported by National Funds through FCT – Foundation for Science and Technology Ref: PEst-OE/SAU/UI0617/2014 FEDER funds through the Operational Competitiveness Programme – COMPETE and by the project FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-028613 (PTDC/DTP-DES/0393/2012).

Declaration of interest

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of this article.