Obesity: Classification, Symptoms and Causes

Obesity is a chronic metabolism disease. It's accompanied by excessive formation of adipose tissue in the body. At the heart of the disease lies energy imbalance, in which amount of incoming energy exceeds energy demands of organism.

Contents:

1. Obesity classification. 
2. Disease symptoms.
3. Obesity causes.
4. References.

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Obesity tends to progress. Over time, the disease involves virtually all organs and systems of organism. There is a specific spectrum of complications as a result. More than a third of the world's population suffer obesity. The highest percentage of cases is in economically developed countries.

The obesity facts worldwide are startling [1]:

• As of 2017, there were about 2.1 billion people in the world who were overweight and a subsect 600 million who suffer from obesity.
• 155 million children are overweight and 41 million children under the age of 5 are obese.
• In countries like India and other developing countries where undernutrition and obesity coexist, the latter causes more deaths.
• Obesity has nearly doubled since 1980.
• A large proportion of the world population is overweight.

Obesity classification.

Nutritionists use the WHO classification. Experts calculate the Body Mass Index (BMI) (weight in kg / height m2). Doctors classify BMI according to the associated risk of developing health problems [2]:

BMI value	Classification	Health risk
Less than 18.5	Underweight	Increased
18.5 to 24.9	Normal weight	Least
25.0 to 29.9	Overweight	Increased
30.0 to 34.9	Obese class I	High
35.0 to 39.9	Obese class II	Very high
40 or higher	Obese class III	Extremely high

However, this classification has a significant lack - a high percentage of fat in the body occurs even with normal body weight. For example, athlete with a well-developed muscle mass can have a BMI corresponding to 1 degree of obesity. Therefore, to determine percentage of fat, water and muscle mass, specialists apply the method of bioimpedance analysis of body composition. It's worth noting, that percentage of fat mass in men is 10-20%, in women 18-28%.

 Body Mass Index (BMI)

According to another classification, doctors divide obesity by:

• Alimanno-constitutional. This type occurs most often and presents at members of the same family. Similar problems occur with a constant violation of the diet or overeating.
• Hypothalamic. This type of disease is the result of abnormalities in the central nervous system. The pathology of hypothalamus leads to it. This part of the brain is responsible for endocrine system. As result, violations of eating behavior emerge in organism.
•  Endocrine. This type of obesity develops with various pathologies of the endocrine system. In this case, the appearance of excess weight is not the main symptom. This type of obesity is rare.

Specialists divide disease according to location of the fat mass to the following types:

• Central or android. This condition is characterized by appearance of fat deposits in the chest, hands and abdomen. This problem affects men in most cases.
•  Gynoid or gluteal-femoral. The fat deposits are usually located in the legs, buttocks and thighs. Women often suffer this type of disease.
•  Mixed obesity. The fat deposits usually distribute throughout the body.

Nutritionists recently begin to use the term "sarcopenic obesity". It's accompanied by loss of muscle mass and muscle strength. This type of disease occurs at elderly people.

Disease symptoms.

Obesity is a serious problem. Overweight can not only disturb and damage internal organs and their work, but also lead to death.

Main obesity symptoms:

• High blood pressure. Overweight people lead a low-activity lifestyle, therefore body doesn't have opportunity to consume fat cells. This leads to increase of pressure. Due to this, heart disease, kidney disease and stroke begin to develop.
•  Cardiovascular diseases. The heart muscle starts to work incorrectly due to high blood pressure. It lead to disruption in the balance of blood and oxygen. The heart attack or stroke may occur with this.
•  Depressive state. Another symptom of disease is a depressed psychological state, which leads to a drop in self-esteem of the patient. When a person begins to feel depressed, he feels anger towards himself and begins to lead an incorrect lifestyle.
•  Osteoarthritis. Symptom is a constant pain in the joints and decrease the physical activity of the patient. This comes due to rapid wear of bone tissue and high pressure on cartilage and joints in the pelvic region.
•  Disease of the respiratory tract. Every patient, who has any degree of obesity, suffers from shortness of breath.

In addition, there are also concomitant symptoms: a delay in breathing during sleep and apnea. Also, experts note excessive ventilation, which leads to pulmonary and cardiac failure.

However, doctors identify the following causes of disease:

• violation of balance between calories and energy expended. Overweight appears, when you increase food intake against a background reduced energy demands of organism;
• violation of the pancreas, intestines and liver;
• genetic pathologies;

 In addition, there are certain factors that significantly increase the likelihood of overweight:

• lack of active lifestyles;
• hereditary predisposition. Increase activity of lipogenesis enzymes or a decrease in  activity of lipolysis enzymes;
• increasing volume of easily digestible carbohydrates in the diet. Consumption of sugary drinks, large amounts of sugar;
• endocrine pathologies - hypothyroidism, insulinoma, hypogonadism;
• eating disorders;
• stressful situations;
• lack of sleep;
• taking psychotropic medications; 

Obesity rarely is the result of traumatic injuries or surgical interventions. Sometimes this problem occurs when surgeons remove the ovaries. Often the appearance of obesity is associated with abnormalities in the menstrual cycle. It's worth considering, that overweight women often collide a violation of metabolism processes.

 

Obesity causes.

Obesity is an increasingly common problem because for many people modern living involves eating excessive amounts of cheap, high-calorie food and spending a lot of time sitting down, at desks, on sofas or in cars. There are also some underlying health conditions that can occasionally contribute to weight gain, such as an underactive thyroid gland (hypothyroidism), although these type of conditions don’t usually cause weight problems if they're effectively controlled with medication [3].

References.

I guided by various sources of information, when writing the article. Below are the links of the resources that helped me:

1. Some facts about obesity by the link https://www.medindia.net/patients/patientinfo/obesity.htm
2. Read more https://brightpharm.com/buy-orlistat-uk.html, where to purchase Orlistat in the UK by discount to treat overweight problems
3. Check resourse https://medbroadcast.com/condition/getcondition/obesity and get information about obesity