Clinical Research Directory

Black Girls Move Physical Activity and Improving Dietary Intake Among Black Adolescent Daughters

Black Girls Move is a school-linked daughter/mother physical activity and dietary behavior program, with 9th and 10th grade students. This program is designed to prevent obesity in Black adolescent females and thus aligns with the NIH mission to enhance health, lengthen life, and reduce illness and disability. This project is relevant to public health because it holds the potential to reduce population health disparities impacted by structural racism.

Early Life Intervention in Pediatrics Supported by E-health

Childhood obesity in early life contributes to the development of specific NCDs, i.e. adult obesity. Unhealthy diet and low level of physical activity are lifestyle risk behaviors associated with chronic, systemic inflammation, which promotes the pathogenesis of NCDs. Early preventive measures to improve lifestyle behavior are of utmost importance. The aim of ELIPSE-I is to assess whether an eHealth application intervention for parents is feasible and efficacious in lowering total energy intake/total energy expenditure (TEI/TEE) ratio in their children with BMI \>97 centile (ELIPSE-I).

Physiologic Response to Bariatric Surgery and the Impact of Adjunct Semaglutide in Adolescents

The study plans to learn more about what happens to the body after bariatric surgery in people 12 to 24 years old. The study aims to understand why people respond differently to bariatric surgery and how to define success beyond weight loss alone. The study also plans to learn more about whether a medication (semaglutide) can help people 12 to 24 years old who, between 1 and 2 years after bariatric surgery, have not lost as much weight as expected.

Self-Weighing for Adolescents Seeking Obesity Treatment

99 patients age 12 to \<18 years old with obesity (BMI \>/=95th percentile), will be randomized to one of three treatment interventions: 1. Usual Care 2. Usual Care plus advice to weigh daily on simple scale 3. Usual Care plus advice to weigh-daily on an EHR-connected scale Survey data collected at baseline, 2, 4, 6, and 12-weeks, and qualitative interviews at 12 weeks, will assess acceptability, safety, self-efficacy, and BMI. Recruitment will also be assessed (% eligible patients who consent). In order to understand real-world feasibility of this intervention, the clinic staff will work with patients to connect the scales to Epic.

A Multicenter Study for Evaluating a Digital Support System in Childhood Obesity Treatment

Evira is a digital support system newly developed for treatment of childhood obesity. Through daily weighings at home using a special scale together with a message function in the Evira application, enabling fast and easy communication with the clinic, parents and the clinicians can easily follow the child's weight development. The purpose of this randomized controlled study is to evaluate the effect of adding Evira to the already locally used life-style treatment of childhood obesity.

Effect of Amino Acids on Hepatic Fat Content in Adolescents (AMINOS Study)

Participants 13-18 years of age with extra fat stored in the liver will be randomly assigned to a protein supplement or placebo "fake supplement" for 2 months to see if the participants who get the protein supplement have less fat in the liver compared to participants who were in the placebo group. After the 2 month intervention, all participants can continue the study and will all receive the protein supplement for an additional 10-months.

Childhood Obesity - Prevention of Diabetes Through Changed Eating Patterns

The main purpose of the present study is to perform a 10 weeks dietary intervention study with a follow-up for 52 weeks in children from 7-14 years of age with overweight or obesity. In a caloric restricted and increased physical activity setting the control group will consume a low-moderate protein (15E%/day) diet whereas the intervention group will consume a higher protein (25E%/day) diet. Secondary, the investigators want to investigate the effect of frequent follow-up after the intervention, and the overall effect of the lifestyle camp. Compared to the low-moderate protein diet, the investigators hypothesis that a diet with higher consumption of protein-containing foods will more effectively induce weight loss (a reduction in BMI-SDS) or weight maintenance in children with overweight or obesity, and improve quality of life, and risk factors for type 2 diabetes.

Type 1 Diabetes Adolescents for Healthier Lifestyles Study

Before the 1990s, obesity was rare among young people with type 1 diabetes (T1D), but now it is more common. Recent studies show that over 50% of young people with T1D will have overweight or obesity within five years of being diagnosed with T1D. Both obesity and T1D increase the risk of heart disease, and combined, these risks are even higher. Intensive health behavior and lifestyle treatments (IHBLTs) are proven to be effective for treating childhood obesity. However, managing T1D creates unique challenges that require adjustments to these treatments. For example, people with T1D need to eat even when they're not hungry to treat low blood sugar, blood sugar changes can make exercise harder, and some recommended "free foods" are high in unhealthy fats. Young people with T1D are also more likely to develop eating disorders. There is a need for IHBLTs that address these specific challenges and focus on preventing eating disorders in this group. To address these needs, we developed the Type 1 Diabetes Adolescents for healthier Lifestyles (T1DAL) program, based on feedback from teenagers with T1D, their parents/caregivers, and pediatric endocrinologists. The goal of this study is to test whether the T1DAL program can improve the health and wellbeing of teens compared to usual care. In this study, about 50 teens will be randomly assigned to either the T1DAL program or to Usual Care. Those in the T1DAL group will take part in a 16-week program designed specifically for teens with T1D to improve eating habits and diabetes management. Those in the Usual Care group will continue with their regular endocrinology appointments. At the end of the study, the Usual Care group will be offered a shortened version of the T1DAL program. All participants will have their height, weight, blood glucose, eating habits, diabetes management behaviors, and mood measured at the start and end of the study. They will also answer questions to track unhealthy eating and weight control behaviors over time. Additional analyses will look at factors that may lead to these behaviors in real life. This project builds on Dr. Warnick's previous work in pediatric obesity and T1D, and it supports the NIDDK's goal of reducing diabetes-related heart problems. T1DAL could become an important public health program to improve the health of teens with T1D.

Puberty, Diabetes, and the Kidneys, When Eustress Becomes Distress (PANTHER Study)

Early diabetic kidney disease (DKD) occurs in 50-70% of youth with type 2 diabetes (T2D) and confers high lifetime risk of dialysis and premature death. Youth-onset T2D typically manifests during or shortly after puberty in adolescents with obesity. Epidemiological data implicate puberty as an accelerator of kidney disease in youth with obesity and diabetes and the investigators posit that the link between puberty and T2D-onset may explain the high burden of DKD in youth-onset T2D. A better understanding of the impact of puberty on kidney health is needed to promote preservation of native kidney function, especially in youth with T2D.

The Effect of Time-Restricted Feeding on Body Composition and Some Metabolic Parameters in Obese Adolescents

Obesity is now recognized as a serious public health problem. It is known that obesity seen in adolescence is largely carried over to adulthood. Therefore, its treatment is important both in terms of protecting current health and preventing diseases in adulthood. Reducing energy intake plays an important role in the treatment of obesity. However, long-term adherence and effectiveness to energy restriction appear to be limited. Therefore, the need for interventions that are "effective in body weight loss" and "accessible, simple and lifestyle modification to increase dietary compliance" is clear. Time-restricted feeding is a specialized intermittent fasting protocol that includes consistent fasting and eating periods over a 24-hour cycle by supporting circadian rhythms. Especially in the adult population, positive effects of time-restricted feeding such as weight loss and blood glucose regulation are observed. However, there are limited data on this subject for adolescents. Today, the Mediterranean diet, which is one of the nutrition models that supports health, is a beneficial nutritional model that reduces body weight and obesity-related comorbidities by limiting total energy intake. However, no study has been found in the literature in which the effectiveness of time-restricted nutrition, which is a new and promising approach, and the Mediterranean diet, which is a sustainable diet model, are evaluated together. Therefore, in this study, it was aimed to evaluate the effects of planned time-restricted nutrition compatible with circadian rhythm and energy-restricted feeding planned according to the Mediterranean diet model on body composition and various metabolic parameters in obese adolescents. 60 obese adolescents aged 12-18 years will be included in this randomized controlled and parallel design study. Participants will be randomized to one of two treatment groups for a 12-week intervention. The time-restricted feeding group will form the intervention group of the study, and the energy-restricted feeding group will form the control group. Anthropometric measurements of the participants at the beginning and end of the study will be taken, and various biochemical parameters will be evaluated with the body composition and blood samples to be taken. As a result of the study, it is expected to determine the effectiveness of time-restricted feeding compared to energy-restricted feeding in terms of dietary compliance, body composition and biochemical changes.

Dietary Modulation of Gut Microbiota in Overweight/Obese Adolescents and COVID-19 Infection

Probiotic intervention has been currently suggested to provide supportive benefits in promoting health, including alleviating disease symptoms, protecting against diarrhea and respiratory infection, affecting growth and modulating the immune system by improving the beneficial gut microbiota colonization, giving direction on the gut-lung-axis pathway. This indicates that probiotics may become alternative to improve nutrition and reduce the risk of viral infections which may reduce the risk against Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Corona Virus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). Introduction to probiotics during adolescence can alleviate inflammation and invert dysbiosis. However, evidence on the effect of probiotic supplementation on enhancing antibody response to SARS COV-2 in adolescents is lacking. Moreover, previous studies showed the potential effect of probiotic supplementation to improve overweight and obesity in adolescents. A bi-directional relationship exists among nutrition, infection, and immunity as changes in one element will affect the others. The main objective of this study is to investigate the effect of dietary modulation of overweight and obese adolescent's gut microbiota through probiotic supplementation combined with healthy eating and physical activity counseling and psychosocial stimulation on nutritional status and antibody response to COVID-19 vaccination. This trial will conduct a 20-week intervention for overweight and obese adolescents.

Teen Weight Control

The prevalence of obesity in adolescents is remarkably high, with 38.7% of youth 12-15 years of age and 41.5% of 16-19 year olds meeting criteria for overweight or obesity. Behavioral weight control interventions for adolescents have had limited impact on this field and there is considerably more that needs to be done. Notably, adolescents who have difficulty managing their feelings have been found to consume higher caloric foods and report greater amounts of sedentary time. Poor emotion management among adolescents has also been associated with more rapid weight gain and higher BMI. Data from adolescents with overweight/obesity attending our outpatient weight management program (N=124) indicate that 82% of these youth report emotion regulation scores that are comparable to youth with significant mental health problems. Despite documented relationships between adolescent weight control and emotion regulation, no proven adolescent weight management programs targeting emotion regulation exist. To fill this gap, our laboratory developed and piloted an adolescent weight control intervention (HealthTRAC) that combines two previously tested effective interventions, one targeting emotion regulation skill building, the other focused on behavioral weight control. Findings from our small pilot trial are promising and indicate that the newly created HealthTRAC intervention is acceptable to parents and teens, easy to deliver, and leads to modest weight loss and improved emotion management skills compared to a standard behavioral weight control (SBWC) program. These data suggest that emotion regulation is related to weight management and may assist adolescents with overweight/obesity who are seeking to lose weight. The current multi-site study builds on this previous work and will examine the impact of the developed HealthTRAC intervention on improving emotion regulation skills and reducing adolescent BMI in a larger sample with longer term follow-up (18 months after starting the intervention). Adolescents will receive 27.5 hours of intervention time over a 12- month period. We expect that adolescents enrolled in the HealthTRAC intervention will show greater reduction in BMI over the 12-month program and will sustain these losses up to 18 months after starting the intervention compared to teens enrolled in SBWC. The information learned from this project will help us better understand how helping adolescents manage their emotions can improve weight loss outcomes.

Improving Sleep, Decision-Making, and Eating in Adolescents with Obesity

This study is being performed to understand the effects of a lifestyle modification and sleep intervention on weight loss outcomes in adolescence. The main question the study aims to answer is: \- What are the initial effects of a lifestyle modification and sleep intervention, including effects on weight, eating behaviors and dietary intake, and sleep? Participants will: * Participate in remote, group-based, weekly weight loss and sleep coaching for 16 weeks. * Complete study assessments at baseline (pre-intervention), mid-intervention, and post-intervention. * Complete daily sleep diaries for three 7-day periods at each assessment point.

Treatment and Handling Severe Obesity-Related Comorbidities in Adolescents Through Exercise

The main objective of this project is to analyze the effect of a tailor-made, one-to-one, exercise program (aiming to treat and handle obesity-related comorbidities in adolescents with severe obesity at high risk of cardiovascular disease development) on BMI z-score, specific comorbidities, and other health-related indicators. This project will further allow to analyze the long-term impact of the exercise program not only on clinical parameters, but also on the interaction with drug-treatment, health-related behaviors, and quality of life, further contributing to the understanding of the individual characteristics associated with a positive exercise response and frequency. The secondary objective of the THOR-X project is to build an educational toolkit, based on project results and relevant literature, addressed to health and exercise professionals, in order to improve management of adolescents with obesity, in particular those with severe obesity.

Renal Hemodynamics, Energetics and Insulin Resistance: A Follow-up Study

The current protocol plans to enroll participants with youth-onset Type 2 Diabetes (T2D) as well as obese and lean controls from the Renal-HEIR - Renal Hemodynamics, Energetics and Insulin Resistance in Youth Onset Type 2 Diabetes Study (n=100) \[COMIRB #16-1752\] in a prospective investigation that seeks to 1) define the changes in kidney function by gold standard techniques and energetics by functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) in adolescents with and without T2D as they transition to young adulthood; 2) quantify kidney oxidative metabolism by 11C-acetate Positron Emission Tomography (PET) in a subset of participants who are ≥18 years of age with youth-onset T2D and/or obesity; 3) determine peripheral arterial stiffness by SphygmoCor. Mechanistic insight will be provided by transcriptomic analyses of repeat biopsies 3-years after their initial biopsy for eligible participants with youth-onset T2D, as well as molecular analysis of tissue obtained from J-wire endovascular biopsies. This study will also leverage this well-characterized cohort of youths to define youth-onset T2D-related changes in brain morphology and function by structural MRI and resting-state functional MRI and through the assessment of cognitive function (fluid and crystallized intelligence) using the NIH Toolbox Cognitive Battery (NIHTB-CB), as an exploratory objective. All enrollees in Renal-HEIR have consented to be contacted for future research opportunities.

Registry on Obesity Surgery in Adolescents

While bariatric surgery is established as a safe and effective alternative with well-defined risks for severely obese adults, little has been published on its use in children. There are many unresolved questions concerning the long-term metabolic and psychological consequences of bariatric surgery in adolescents, and the difference with the adult population. The appropriate timing for bariatric surgery in young people, and the predictors of success and safety still need to be determined. The aim of this long-term prospective study is therefore to establish the safety and efficacy profile of surgical procedures and to clarify whether reductions in morbidity and mortality outweigh the risks of serious surgical complications and lifelong nutritional deficiencies.