400 Cleveland families to take part in NIH obesity study

The National Institutes of Health announced Monday that more than 400 families in Cleveland will join a $50 million national study aimed at discovery the root causes of childhood obesity (Source: “NIH-funded obesity study to track kids in 400 Cleveland families,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, Nov. 15, 2010).

Three researchers at Case Western Reserve University were awarded $12.5 million over the next two years to recruit and track overweight and obese students from 50 Cleveland schools. The project is aimed at reaching every area of a child’s environment, from their homes to their schools to their neighborhoods.

Case, which is partnering on the project with the Cleveland City Schools and the YMCA of Greater Cleveland, is one of four universities selected to participate in the Childhood Obesity Prevention and Treatment Research Initiative, along with Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, Tenn, Stanford University, Palo Alto, Calif. and University of Minnesota, Minneapolis-St. Paul.

According to Leona Cuttler, professor of pediatrics at CWRU and one of three principal investigators for the study, as many as 40 percent of children in Cleveland are overweight or obese.