Exactly what triggers people to choose to be obese or even 20 lbs overweight? I find it disgusting.  People have to realize being overweight is unhealthly and puts that person at extreme risk for health problems. How sad it must be for young children not to have parents that can run with them in the park or worse yet lose one to heart disease, stroke or cancer.

hmmm. Me again, commenting twice.

My 5 month old daughter has "pectus excavatum ", the docs said it's mild and won't show when she's an adult, they only seemed concerned with it for cosmetic reasons.

I also have thought that the roof of her mouth seemed "deeper" or higher I guess you could say, than my other daughter's was in infancy. But, 5 monther with pectus excavatum doesn't have slender fingers, though she is quite long, repeated ultrasounds showed she had long legs. Is she possibly at higher risk for heart problems as an adult? Why wouldn't 2 different family docs know this, or tell me about it?

An ultrasound of the heart, or echocardiogram, would settle the question. It's a harmless test that requires just a few minutes. If your daughter's doctor won't order it, find one that will.

I'm saddened but not surprised that a doctor would call pectus excavatum just a curiosity.  I have quite a number of heart and lung ailments from my PE.  Had my doctor felt differently about PE when I was a kid and had suggested surgery, I would have suffered less than I have to having the surgery in my 30s. They say the teen years are the best time for surgical repair of PE. So yes, PE does cause heart and lung problems in adults.  At least this adult.

Here's a relevant cite:
Cardiovascular function following surgical repair of pectus excavatum: a metaanalysis.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=16899852&query_hl=2&itool=pubmed_docsum

I am a 69 year old retired fysician.With a moderate congenital pectus excavatum. For more than 10 years I suffered from complaints like shorness of breath, fatigue and arythmia.Even a catheter ablation has been performed 4 years ago to stop Supraventricular tachycardia of 220.min. After 3 months a more moderate tachycardia returned. My complaints where posture dependent: bending or pressure on the upper abdomen or the pectus cavity did increase the problems.
CT showed cardiocompression!
To go short: after corrective surgery (Ravitch) my complaints have totally disappeared. I could stop with all medicines, can walk uphill agian and cycle with proper speed. Reborn without reincarnation.
Lesson: symptomatic pectus excavatum can also happen to senior people an dcorrective surgery is worth while.
See also:  http://www.spesweb.nl/SPES_English.htm

It could mean that some attention and exploration of how floppy his mitral valve might be could be useful, e.g., an ultrasound or echocardiogram. He might even require oral antibiotics at the time of any oral or some gastrointestinal procedures, since floppy valve are more susceptible to blood infections when potentially "dirty" orifices are instrumented.