The role of parents in pre-adolescent and adolescent overweight and obesity treatment: a systematic review of clinical recommendations

The study aims to describe clinical recommendations (i) on the role of parents in both pre-adolescent and adolescent overweight and obesity treatment; (ii) to health professionals on how to involve parents in paediatric overweight and obesity treatment and (iii) to identify deficiencies in the associated literature. A systematic literature review was conducted in March 2010 to identify clinical practice guidelines, position or consensus statements on clinical management of paediatric overweight or obesity, developed by a national or international health professional association or government agency, and endorsed for current use. Relevant clinical recommendations in these documents were identified via a screen for the words 'parent', 'family' and synonyms. Twenty documents were included. Most documents emphasized the importance of involving parents or the family in paediatric overweight and obesity treatment with approximately a third of documents providing separate recommendations on the role of parents/family for pre-adolescents and adolescents. The documents varied markedly with regard to the presence of recommendations on parent/family involvement in the various components of lifestyle interventions or bariatric surgery. Almost half of the documents contained recommendations to health professionals regarding interactions with parents. High-quality research is needed on age-specific techniques to optimize the involvement of parents and family members in paediatric overweight and obesity treatment.