TITLE:
Health production and risk of obesity among Chilean adolescents: Understanding health related behaviors in youth
AUTHORS:
Paulina Correa-Burrows, Raquel Burrows, Ricardo Uauy, Cecilia Albala
KEYWORDS:
Adolescent Health; Adolescent Obesity; Health Behavior; Health Promotion; Non-Communicable Diseases; Chile
JOURNAL NAME:
Health,
Vol.4 No.12A,
December
31,
2012
ABSTRACT:
Background:
Adolescent obesity is associated with high cardiovascular and metabolic risk.
Western diet and reduced physical activity are strong environmental
determinants. The “Health Production” model posits that individuals born with a
certain amount of health stock, which depreciates over life, but can be
augmented by individual behaviors, including exercise and dieting. Objective:
To study the association between health production and obesity in a random
sample of 1692 Chilean adolescents (14.8 ± 0.7 years old), and to study the
effect of gender and socioeconomic characteristics on health production.
Method: We used an indicator that considered the quality of food intake and
physical activity, establishing three categories: good (GHP), intermediate
(IHP) and poor health producers (PHP). Multivariate analysis was used to
study the odds of obesity and good health production. Results: There was 31%
of GHP, 32% of IHP and 38% of PHP. Obesity (Adj. OR: 1.59; 95%CI: 1.04 - 2.42)
and abdominal obesity (Adj. OR: 2.24; 95%CI: 1.35 - 3.40) were significantly
higher in the PHP group, compared to the GHP and IHP group. Health production
was significantly associated with socioeconomic factors and gender. Female
sex and coming from a less wealthy household significantly reduced the odds of
good health production. Conclusions: Poor health production in adolescence, as
defined by food intake and physical activity, depreciates individuals’ “health stock”, increasing the risk of
obesity. In our sample, health production was strongly associated with socio-economic factors and gender.