Obesity may pose a serious health concern for children diagnosed with cancer, according to a recent population-based study conducted by researchers at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Sainte-Justine in Montreal. The findings, published by Wiley online in CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society, indicate that among children with cancer, those who are obese at the time of diagnosis may face an elevated risk of dying.
The retrospective study relied on data from the Cancer in Young People in Canada (CYP-C) database, which includes all children with newly diagnosed cancer between the ages of 2 and 18 across Canada from 2001 to 2020. Among 11,291 children with cancer in the study, 10.5% were classified as obese, defined as age and sex-adjusted body mass index at or above the 95th percentile.
Investigators measured 5-year event-free survival—meaning survival free of cancer relapse—and overall survival. Compared with patients who were not obese at diagnosis, those with obesity had lower rates of 5-year event-free survival (77.5% versus 79.6%) and overall survival (83.0% versus 85.9%). After adjusting for factors such as age, sex, ethnicity, neighborhood income quintile, treatment era, and cancer categories, obesity at diagnosis was linked with a 16% increase in the risk of relapse and a 29% increase in the risk of death. The negative impact of obesity on prognosis was especially pronounced in patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia and brain tumors.
“Our study highlights the negative impact of obesity among all types of childhood cancers. It provides the rationale to evaluate different strategies to mitigate the adverse risk of obesity on cancer outcomes in future trials,” said co-senior author Thai Hoa Tran, MD, of the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Sainte-Justine in Montreal. “It also reinforces the urgent need to reduce the epidemic of childhood obesity as it can result in significant health consequences.”
The article was written with the assistance of a news analysis system.