Occurrence of hyperlipidemia in relation to body mass index in school children aged 9–11

Abstract

Background. There is a link between lipid disorders and body mass and the occurrence of cardiovascular diseases. This study aimed at establishing the prevalence of lipid abnormalities in relation to body mass in children aged 9–11.

Materials and methods. The study involved 232 presumably healthy school children aged 9-11. Fasting venous blood samples were taken from every child to assess the lipid profile: total cholesterol (TC), LDL cholesterol (LDL-C, direct measurement), HDL cholesterol (HDL-C) and triglycerides (TG). Anthropometric measurements were performed including height and weight, followed by calculating the body mass index (BMI) by using an online “OLAF” calculator.

Results. The prevalence of hypercholesterolemia and an elevated concentration of LDL-C in the group of children was high and equaled 51.1% and 34.6%, respectively. Hypertriglyceridemia in the respective age groups of 9 and 10–11 years was found to be: 41.6% and 27.7%. Only in 9.5% of children the level of HDL-C was lower than optimal. The percentage of overweight was two-fold higher among boys than in girls (13.6 v. 6.9%), similarly the percentage of obesity was higher in boys compared with that in girls (15.5 v. 10.3%).

Conclusions. In school children aged 9–11 the dominant and most frequent lipid abnormality, not associated with an increased body mass, was hypercholesterolemia followed by hypertriglyceridemia. Overweight and obesity were strongly related to gender and much more frequent among boys. There should be more attention paid to dyslipidemia and body weight already in childhood in the context of health policy and prevention.