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Clinical nutrition

Healthy breakfast habits and changes in obesity-related cardiometabolic markers in children: a longitudinal analysis

Abstract

Background

Data on the association of breakfast habits and changes in cardiometabolic markers in children are limited.

Methods

In total, 6964 children aged 6–13 years from Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing, Jinan, Harbin, and Guangzhou were included in the final analysis. Daily consumption, consumption of ≥3 food groups, and at-home consumption were defined as healthy breakfast habits. Blood pressure, % fat mass, total cholesterol (TC), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), triglycerides, glucose, and 50-m × 8 shuttle run were measured at baseline (May 2009) and follow-up (May 2010). Clustered cardiometabolic risk score (CCRS) was computed by summing Z scores of five components: % fat mass, systolic blood pressure, glucose, TC to HDL-C ratio, and triglyceride.

Results

Children who ate breakfast daily had a higher decrease in TC to HDL-C ratio and a higher increase in HDL-C compared with breakfast skippers (both P values < 0.05). There was an inverse association of the number of food groups consumed at breakfast with the change in CCRS (P trend = 0.005). At-home breakfast consumption was associated with a lower increase in BMI, LDL-C, TC to HDL-C ratio, fasting glucose, and 50-m × 8 shuttle run and a higher increase in HDL-C (all P values < 0.05). Children with two or three healthy breakfast habits had a lower increase in CCRS, LDL-C, TC to HDL-C ratio, glucose, and a higher increase in HDL-C compared with those with none or one (all P values < 0.05).

Conclusions

Healthy breakfast habits might help minimize the cardiometabolic risk factors in children.

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Fig. 1: Flowchart of population selection.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the support of other team members and the participated students, teachers, parents, and local education and health staff members.

Funding

This project was funded by the China Ministry of Science & Technology as Key Projects in the National Science & Technology Pillar Program during the Eleventh Five-Year Plan Period (2008BAI58B05).

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Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Contributions

GM conceived and designed the research. GM, YiL, JM, GX, HG, TL, and SD performed the experiments. XS and YaL performed data analysis and interpretation. XS wrote the initial draft of the paper. XS, YaL, HX, and GM revised the paper. All authors read and approved the final paper.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Guansheng Ma.

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethics

The study protocol was approved by the Ethical Review Committee of the National Institute for Nutrition and Food Safety, Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.

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Written informed consent was obtained from parents, the next of kin, carers, or guardians of all the participants.

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Shang, X., Li, Y., Xu, H. et al. Healthy breakfast habits and changes in obesity-related cardiometabolic markers in children: a longitudinal analysis. Eur J Clin Nutr 74, 1685–1697 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41430-020-0614-7

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