Heart Risk Factors for Obese Kids Murky

HealthDayNews — More of America’s young people are getting fat, but the results aren’t showing up consistently in obesity-related risk factors for heart disease, U.S. researchers report.

While the results from a new study don’t show any smoking gun finding cardiovascular problems in kids, another expert says this is no cause for complacency.

Data from two national surveys shows that the waist circumference of boys aged 2 to 17 expanded by 1.6 centimeters (about two-thirds of an inch) from the average reported in a 1988-1994 study to one done in 1999-2000, according to the study in the December issue of Pediatrics.

A group led by Dr. Earl S. Ford of the Division of Adult and Community Health at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that the waistline of girls in the same age group expanded by 2.4 centimeters, almost a full inch.

And readings of blood pressure, a significant risk factor, were up by 2.2 points in the 8-to-17 age group, the study found. These findings are consistent with what observers had noticed in the last decade, but others were not.

For instance, blood levels of cholesterol — both LDL, the "bad" kind that clogs arteries, and HDL, the "good" kind — were relatively unchanged, while blood levels of triglycerides, fat molecules related to heart risk, and of glucose, a marker of diabetes risk, actually declined slightly between the two surveys, the researchers reported.

And so, they concluded, "The effects of the increasing prevalence of obesity on the cardiovascular health of children and adolescents remain unclear."

But the report shouldn’t give parents "a false sense of security," said Dr. Stephen R. Daniels, a professor of pediatrics and environmental health at the Cincinnati Children’s Medical Center and a spokesman for the American Heart Association.

"Some of these findings might be seen as reassuring, but we know over time that these relationships might change," Daniels said. "The timing probably is one in which obesity develops first, then other risk factors are affected downstream."

It’s also possible that the averages don’t single out groups of youngsters who already are at higher risk, like those with the biggest waistlines, Daniels said.

"No one is saying that kids who are obese now won’t have problems later," he said.

There is ample reason to suspect trouble ahead, the CDC researchers said. Type 2 diabetes, the kind that generally develops later in life, is showing up more often in young people, they note, and "obesity during childhood is also associated with increased risks of various diseases and death when these children reach their adult years."

So even though the numbers in this study aren’t as definitive as might be expected, "the obesity epidemic among children poses a potentially serious challenge to the collective health of the U.S. population."

More information

The risks of childhood obesity and what can be done about it can be found at the American Heart Association.

SOURCES: Stephen R. Daniels, M.D., professor, pediatrics and environmental health, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center; December 2004 Pediatrics~HRTS~~OBES~~KIDS~~HICH~~HRTW~