A study covering over 10,000 children in five metropolitan cities suggests that a child’s waist circumference can help predict metabolic diseases. The study, carried out on children in Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata, Pune and Raipur, identified cutoff values of Waist Circumference (WC) to screen children for Metabolic Syndrome. Metabolic Syndrome can result in hypertension, type 2 diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular diseases. Dr Anuradha Khadilkar, consultant paediatrician at Jehangir Hospital in Pune and co-author of the study, said Indian children with 70th waist circumference percentile were at risk of developing metabolic diseases. The global waist circumference cutoff for obesity in children, proposed by the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), USA, is 90th percentile. Previous Indian studies have suggested a cutoff of 75th percentile to screen children for Metabolic Syndrome. The International Diabetes Federation includes waist circumference as a criterion for diagnosis of Metabolic Syndrome in children. “We found that primary or essential hypertension, commonly seen in adults, is becoming common in children, who are obese or overweight, leading to disorders in metabolism,” Dr Khadilkar said. In the study, which will be published in the forthcoming issue of the Journal of Paediatrics, doctors measured the height, weight, blood pressure (BP) and waist circumference of 10,842 children, of whom 6,065 were boys. The study was carried out in Jehangir Hospital, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital (Delhi), Apollo Gleneagles Hospitals (Kolkata) and Ekta Institute of Child Health (Raipur), among others. “Metabolic Syndrome in children has been defined as the presence of high triglyceride levels in blood, low HDL cholesterol (good cholesterol), increased fasting blood glucose levels, high systolic blood pressure and waist circumference less than 75th percentile,” Dr Archana Dayal Arya, paediatric endocrinologist at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital and co-author of the study, said. The study found that 3.3 per cent or 358 out of the 10,842 children were hypertensive. “It is shocking to see children as young as six years old with diseases like hypertension, diabetes mellitus and abnormalities in lipid profile,” Dr Arya said.
