Assessing the Impact of Obesity on Maternal and Child Health among Women of Child-Bearing Age

Introduction to first chapter

1.Background

The chosen topic for this dissertation is assessing the impact of obesity on maternal and child health among women of child-bearing age.In this essay secondary research methods will be used to collect the information needed for this dissertation, which is information that has already been collected by other researchers. The qualitative data that will be used for this research will be sourced from search engines such as google scholar, textbooks, university library, government websites, pubmed and many more. The selection criteria will include peer-reviewed articles published in the last ten years, focusing specifically on obesity prevention strategies for women in their child-bearing age.

The World Health Organization has declared obesity as a worldwide epidemic with more than four million individuals losing their lives every year due to obesity and overweight issues. (Obesity Collaborators, 2017).The National Health and Nutrition survey stated that between 2015 and 2016, 39.8% of adults in the United States were obese. It further highlighted that the rate of obesity had tripled from the year 1975 to 2016 and as a result obesity is a threat (Basu et al,2023).The World Health Organization report states that obesity affected 650 million individuals in the year 2016 and as such the problem of obesity had reached epidemic levels within the last 50 years (Basu et al,2023).

Maternal obesity is an important topic because of the alarming increase of obesity, due to this problem. There is an urgent need for focused investigation as well as educating the public on what to do to control this problem (Kjolhede et al,2008). Apart from the severe weight issues associated with this, these women suffer from a lot of life threatening health issues such as the following:

• Cesarian section during delivery due to complications
• Preeclampsia which could lead to stillbirth or end the life of the mother
• Gestational diabetes

The conditions above and other related issues to do with maternal obesity requires urgent attention ((Kjolhede et al, 2008).

Obesity and overweight are the term given to people who have excessive or abnormal accumulation of fat in their bodies which affects their health (Apovian,2016). These health issues are conditions which affects millions of people.When patients are excessively overweight, it affects their general health. (Apovian,2016).

The world health organization, states that between 1975 and 2016, the widespread presence of obese adolescents and youngsters has become greater globally with an increase of between 4% to 18% (Angela Spinelli, 2021).

The World Health Organization stated that obesity and overweight issues which was once considered to be a problem in developed countries has now changed. It is now common in middle and low income nations (Angela Spinelli,2021).

The consumption of high-calorie foods, lack of physical exercise, driving cars everywhere and various current lifestyles which are all termed modern lifestyles have all contributed to the problem of obesity (Anderson et al, 2006).

In recent times the public have contributed in raising the awareness of obesity by talking about the health issues which are related to it (Seidell et al,1997).A body mass index of 30kg/m 2 and higher is termed as obesity and having a BMI of between 25 and 30 kg/m 2 is classified as being overweight (Seidell et al,1997).

Due to the rising problem of Obesity, midwives as well as healthcare providers in general are faced with various challenges when it comes to caring for these women who are within the child bearing age.The World Health Organization states that there are more than a billion adults suffering from overweight issues (Mills et al, 2011).

Research Questions and its objectives

Research Question:What problems do obese women within child bearing age face?

The aim of this research is to find ways and means to prevent the problem of obesity amongst women around the age of child bearing as well as cut down on the severe medical issues associated with obesity.

The objectives of this research are to investigate the rising issue of women within the child bearing age by researching extensively from the research engines mentioned above.This is important to gain a better insight about the effects of obesity, because this issue has become a difficult health problem which shortens the life span of most of these adult females. Majority of these women suffer from infertility issues due to the negative effects caused by this problem. Hence the problem of obesity needs to be tackled in order to reduce the rate of infertility amongst these women.

Another objective is to investigate the consequences that excessive weight gain and obesity causes amongst females within the child bearing age especially when it comes to illnesses such as:

• diabetes
• suffering from hypertension and many more health problems

Possible death during pregnancy and delivery is also associated with obesity

This creates an awareness of the effects of obesity on these women.

This dissertation will consist of six chapters, and follows the structure as below

Chapter 1, will be an introduction of the topic, highlighting the discussion of this dissertation. Chapter 2 includes the full literature review discussing the aims and objectives of the topic. Chapter 3 outlines the methodology, Chapter 4 presents the findings, Chapter 5 provides analysis and the final chapter brings the study to a conclusion with recommendations for future research.

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