Reliable prediction of childhood obesity using only routinely collected EHRs may be possible

Background

Early identification of children at high risk of obesity can provide clinicians with the information needed to provide targeted lifestyle counseling to high-risk children at a critical time to change the disease course.

Objectives

This study aimed to develop predictive models of childhood obesity, applying advanced machine learning methods to a large unaugmented electronic health record (EHR) dataset. This work improves on other studies that have (i) relied on data not routinely available in EHRs (like prenatal data), (ii) focused on single-age predictions, or (iii) not been rigorously validated.

Methods

A customized sequential deep-learning model to predict the development of obesity was built, using EHR data from 36,191 diverse children aged 0–10 years. The model was evaluated using extensive discrimination, calibration, and utility analysis; and was validated temporally, geographically, and across various subgroups.

Results

Our results are mostly better or comparable to similar studies. Specifically, the model achieved an AUROC above 0.8 in all cases (with most cases around 0.9) for predicting obesity within the next 3 years for children 2–7 years of age. Validation results show the model's robustness and top predictors match important risk factors of obesity.

Conclusions

Our model can predict the risk of obesity for young children at multiple time points using only routinely collected EHR data, greatly facilitating its integration into clinical care. Our model can be used as an objective screening tool to provide clinicians with insights into a patient's risk for developing obesity so that early lifestyle counseling can be provided to prevent future obesity in young children.