LOW BIRTH WEIGHT AS A PREDICTOR OF CARDIOVASCULAR RISK FACTORS IN CHILDHOOD AND ADOLESCENCE? THE PEP FAMILY HEART STUDY

摘要

Background: Low birth weight is considered a risk factor for cardiovascular disease (CVD) inlater life. Because data in children and adolescents are sparse and controversial, we assessedthe association of birth weight with CVD risk factors in German youths.Methods: We categorized 843 urban children and adolescents aged 3?18 years by quintiles ofbirth weight and measured nine traditional risk factors in terms of body mass index (BMI), waistcircumference (WC), systolic (SBP) and diastolic (DBP) blood pressure, total cholesterol (TC), LDL?C, HDL?C, Non HDL?C and triglycerides (TG). SPSS 21 was used for statistical analysis.Results: Mean values and prevalence of nine anthropometric and lipid risk variables were equallydistributed over the five birth weight groups. Though risk factors clustered between 3.0 kg and4.0 kg of birth weight in both genders we found only one significant correlation of birth weightwith TG for males and females and another one for HDL?C in males. The strongest clusteringof significant regression coefficients occurred in the 2nd birth weight quintile for SBP ( b 0.018), TC ( b ?0.050), LDL?C ( b ?0.039), non LDL?C ( b ?0.049) and log TG ( b ?0.001) in males andfemales.Conclusions: Overall we did not find significant associations between birth weight and ninetraditional cardiovascular risk factors in children and adolescents. However, the 2nd quintile ofbirth weight might suggest clustering of risk factors.