Heavy Teen Girls at Risk for Metabolic Syndrome

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Adolescent girls who carry excess weight around the middle and who have high levels of harmful triglycerides are at increased risk of developing the so-called metabolic syndrome -- a cluster of heart disease and diabetes risk factors such as excess body weight, high blood pressure, high blood sugar, and high cholesterol levels.

Transient preadolescent central adiposity, by contrast, is not associated with metabolic syndrome later in life, researchers report in the November issue of Pediatrics.

The results suggest that "early interventions aimed at managing preteen obesity could reduce the risk of developing the syndrome," lead author Dr. John A. Morrison, from Children's Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, and colleagues note.

The findings are based on a longitudinal study of more than 1000 girls who were followed for 10 years starting at ages 9 and 10. The study focused on the five components of the metabolic syndrome: high waist circumference, high glucose, high triglycerides, low "good" HDL cholesterol, and high blood pressure.

At 9 and 10 years of age, just one girl of each race (0.2 percent) had three or more components of the metabolic syndrome. Ten years later, however, 20 black girls (3.5 percent) and 12 white girls (2.3 percent) had at least three components.

On multivariate analysis, increased waist circumference and high triglyceride level emerged as significant predictors of metabolic syndrome during follow-up, the investigators report.

"The development of abnormal levels of the individual elements constituting the metabolic syndrome can have its origins and onset in adolescence and develop through adulthood," the authors note. "Thus, taking action in adolescence could provide major health benefits," they conclude.

SOURCE: Pediatrics, November 2005.