Major clinical and metabomic approaches to childhood obesity: a systematic review

Abstract

Introduction: In the context of childhood obesity, of children under 5 years of age in Brazil, 7% are overweight and 3% meet the criteria for obesity. Globally, according to a report from the World Health Organization (WHO), it is estimated that the total number of overweight and obese children in the world could reach 75 million by the year 2025. Objective: It was to carry out a systematic review to present the main approaches to clinical and metabolomics of childhood obesity. Methods: The PRISMA Platform systematic review rules were followed. The research was carried out from February to April 2024 in the Scopus, PubMed, Science Direct, Scielo and Google Scholar databases. The quality of the studies was based on the GRADE instrument and the risk of bias was analyzed according to the Cochrane instrument. Results and Conclusion: 110 articles were recruited for the initial evaluation. A total of 41 articles were evaluated and 19 were included in this systematic review. Considering the Cochrane tool for risk of bias, the overall assessment resulted in 28 studies with a high risk of bias and 28 studies that did not meet GRADE. Most studies showed homogeneity in their results, with X2=58.7%>50%. It was concluded that miRNAs are potential biomarkers for the development of pathologies, such as obesity. A heterogeneous group of these molecules was found to be associated with obesity in children. miR-15b-5p, miR-486-5p and hsa-miR-122-5p were considered good candidates for childhood obesity biomarkers. MiRNA-dependent mechanisms regulate up to 60% of all human genes. MiRNAs influence multiple pathways, including insulin signaling, immune-mediated inflammation, adipokine expression, adipogenesis, lipid metabolism, and regulation of food intake.