Effectiveness of Parent-Focused Interventions in the Treatment of Childhood and Adolescent Obesity: A Systematic Review Article

In recent years, more attention has been paid to parent-focused behavioral interventions for the treatment of childhood obesity. Accordingly, this study was conducted with the main objective of reviewing the effectiveness of parent-focused interventions in the treatment of childhood and adolescent obesity, and with the sub-objective of assessing the rate of attrition in selected studies.

1476 articles between1957-2021, with a variety of keywords related to intervention, parent, obesity, and overweight, in the age range of 6-18 years, from the databases of PubMed, Science Direct, and PsyINFO, were identified in the first stage. After applying the inclusion and exclusion criteria and reviewing related articles, finally, ten randomized controlled trial (RCTs) studies, that their main outcome was a decrease in body mass index (BMI), were systematically reviewed. The standard method of evaluating Population,-Intervention-Control groups- Outcomes (PICO) in selecting, and the Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials (CONSORT) in evaluating of the quality of the articles was used.

The range of decrease in standard scores of body mass index at the end of the interventions was between 0.06-0.31, and at the end of 13-24 months follow-up was between 0.16-0.42. The mean attrition rate by the end of the study was 32.3% (13% to 50%).

Comprehensive parent-focused behavioral lifestyle interventions are generally effective in reducing children's body mass index, but it is necessary to interpret the results of current articles with caution, and to conduct comprehensive and standardized research in future.