Obesity is considered a long-term complex disease. Many factors are involved in determining why some people are heavier than others and how much risk they have for developing other medical problems. Science continues to search for answers.

But until the disease is better understood, the control of excess weight is something patients must work at for their entire lives.

That is why it is very important to understand that all current medical interventions, including weight loss surgery, should not be considered medical cures. Rather, they are attempts to reduce the adverse effects of excessive weight and alleviate the serious physical, emotional and social consequences of the disease.

Obesity Causes

Family Influence- A Major Contributory Cause to Obesity

Parental behavioral patterns concerning shopping, cooking, eating and exercise, have an important influence on a child's energy balance and ultimately their weight.

Reduced Energy Expenditure - A Possible Root Cause

People who eat more calories need to burn more calories, otherwise their calorie surplus is stored as fat. For example, if we eat 100 more food calories a day than we burn, we gain about 1 pound in a month. That's about 10 pounds in a year. Over two decades this energy surplus causes a weight gain of 200 pounds!

Family Influence - A Major Contributory Cause to Obesity

Parental behavioral patterns concerning shopping, cooking, eating and exercise, have an important influence on a child's energy balance and ultimately their weight.

Obesity, however, has many causes. The reasons for the imbalance between calorie intake and consumption vary by individual. Your age, sex, and genes, psychological makeup, and environmental factors all may contribute.

Genes: Obesity tends to run in families. This is caused both by genes and by shared diet and lifestyle habits. Having obese relatives does not guarantee that you will be obese.

Sex: Men have more muscle than women, on average. Because muscle burns more calories than other types of tissue, men use more calories than women, even at rest.

Genetic Causes of Modern Obesity

Genes affect a number of weight-related processes in the body, such as metabolic rate, blood glucose metabolism, fat-storage, hormones, to name but a few. Also, some studies of adopted children indicate that adopted children tend to develop weight problems similar to their biological, rather than adoptive, parents.

Lifestyle choices

Lifestyle choices are an important factor in influencing your weight.

Lack of physical activity

Lack of physical activity is another important factor that is related to obesity.

Many of us have jobs that involve sitting at a desk for most of the day, and we rely heavily on our cars to get around.

Medical reasons

In less than one out of every 100 cases, there is a medical reason for obesity.

Endocrine factors: Abnormal influence or imbalance can be one of the causes of obesity. Obesity in women commonly begins at puberty, during pregnancy or at menopause.

Drugs: The use of steroids and insulin is commonly followed by weight gain.

The causes of obesity are rooted in the modern lifestyle, in which the abundant nutrition, rich in fats is accompanied by insufficient consumption of energy, and decreased physical activity. Obesity occurs , when the taking of calories exceeds the amount of energy burnt by human. Facts show that obesity often has more than one cause. The genetic assumption, the regime of nutrition, the physical activity, psychological and other factors.