Abstract
OBJECTIVE: To examine whether birth weight, weight gain from birth to the age of seven or body-mass index at the age of seven have any association with metabolic syndrome as an adult.
DESIGN: A population study.
SUBJECTS: 210 men and 218 women out of a total 712 subjects aged 36, 41 or 46 years in Pieksämäki town, Finland.
MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Weight at birth and weight and height at the age of seven and metabolic syndrome defined as a clustering of hypertension, dyslipidemia (hypertriglyceridaemia or low high-density-lipoprotein cholesterol), and insulin resistance (inferred by abnormal glucose tolerance or hyperinsulinaemia).
RESULTS: No association was found between birth weight and the metabolic syndrome as an adult. Among obese children at the age of seven (body-mass index in the highest quartile), the odds ratio (OR) for the metabolic syndrome in adulthood was 4.4 (95% CI 2.1-9.5) as compared to the other children (the three other quartiles combined). After adjustment for age, sex and current obesity, the risk of the syndrome still was 2.4 (95% CI 2.1-9.5).
CONCLUSION: We could not replicate the close association between low birth weight and the metabolic syndrome in adulthood as has been shown in some earlier studies. Obesity at the age of seven predicts the metabolic syndrome in adulthood.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 print issues and online access
$259.00 per year
only $21.58 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
Similar content being viewed by others
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Vanhala, M., Vanhala, P., Keinänen-Kiukaanniemi, S. et al. Relative weight gain and obesity as a child predict metabolic syndrome as an adult. Int J Obes 23, 656–659 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ijo.0800898
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ijo.0800898
Keywords
This article is cited by
-
Predictive value of body mass index to metabolic syndrome risk factors in Syrian adolescents
Journal of Medical Case Reports (2017)
-
Risk profiles of lipids, blood pressure, and anthropometric measures in childhood and adolescence: project heartBeat!
BMC Obesity (2016)
-
Predictive associations between alternative measures of childhood adiposity and adult cardio-metabolic health
International Journal of Obesity (2011)
-
Effects of UCP2 and UCP3 Variants on the Manifestation of Overweight in Korean Children
Obesity (2009)
-
Metabolic risk-factor clustering estimation in obese children
Journal of Physiology and Biochemistry (2007)