Link between overweight/obese in children and youngsters and occurrence of multiple sclerosis.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: The prevalence of overweight/obesity is a major problem in the world, and the number of MS cases is increasing. This literature study examines the relationship between overweight/obesity in children and adolescents and later occurrence of MS.

METHOD

This is a complete literature survey. The search database is primarily Pubmed using MeSH terms "multiple sclerosis", "obesity", and "overweight", and text words not to restrict searches.

RESULTS

All included studies show a link between being overweight/obese and the presence of MS among people below 20 years of age. The relation is especially true for young girls. The same relation in boys is not significant.

CONCLUSION

The literature survey convincingly revealed a link between young overweight/obese and occurrence of MS, in particular for girls. There is a need for more and larger studies to investigate the molecular mechanisms that link obesity and MS.