Obesity and being overweight is not the same thing. People who are obese have a great amount of fat and are at risk for serious health problems. In order to determine if a person is obese, Doctors use a measurement called a body mass index (BMI) (? Link "Find out your BMI here"). This BMI is a relation between the person's height and mass. A person with a BMI in the 95th percentile will be considered overweight. A BMI between the 85th and 95th percentile generally means that the person is at risk for being overweight. For people who are extremely overweight, namely obese, will exceed the 95th percentile. The formula is flawed when measuring very muscular people. These people may score in the risk related percentiles but only due to a large amount of muscle and not fat. Consult your doctor to verify the exact results from BMI.

What Causes Obesity?

People gain weight when the body takes in more calories than it burns off. Those extra calories are stored as fat. The amount of weight gain that leads to obesity doesn't happen in a few weeks or months. Because being obese is more than just being a few pounds overweight, people who are obese have usually been getting more calories than they need for years.

The Causes:

When the body takes in more calories than it burns off it will store the extra calories as fat and begin to gain weight. Obesity will not result from weeks or even months but rather years of an unhealthy diet. People who are obese have been taking in more than an acceptable amount of calories for years.

Obesity can result from gene structure. Genes can tell your body how fast it will metabolize food. Genes may play a significant role in carrying obesity through families, however culture and dietary habits play a much larger role. Obesity can run in families simply due to a family's customs and habits regarding food. Most cases of obesity arise due to both genetics and familial traditions and culture.

Obesity is also a cause of the general culture. People are much less active now because of television, computers, and video games, which prevent simply going outside to fill any spare time.

Health Risks

Being obese can cause serious complications such as intestinal disease, renal failure, strokes, heart attacks, respiratory diseases etc. Obesity can also create a decrease in overall hygiene because a person will find it more difficult to operate in a range of motions. Obese people can also be at risk of death. Doctors will often suggest that people solve obesity through an array of proper diet and regular exercise. In life-threatening cases of obesity, some people turn to surgery dubbed bariatric surgery in order to quickly lose weight. Find out more about bariatric procedures here.