Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2016 Sep;55(6):2117-27.
doi: 10.1007/s00394-015-1026-7. Epub 2015 Sep 2.

Protein intake in early childhood and cardiometabolic health at school age: the Generation R Study

Trudy Voortman  1   2 , Edith H van den Hooven  3   4 , Myrte J Tielemans  3   4 , Albert Hofman  3 , Jessica C Kiefte-de Jong  3 , Vincent W V Jaddoe  3   4   5 , Oscar H Franco  3
Affiliations

Protein intake in early childhood and cardiometabolic health at school age: the Generation R Study

Trudy Voortman et al. Eur J Nutr. 2016 Sep.

Abstract

Purpose: High protein intake in infancy has been linked to obesity. We aimed to examine the associations of protein intake in early childhood with cardiovascular and metabolic outcomes at school age.

Methods: This study was performed in 2965 children participating in a population-based prospective cohort study. Protein intake at 1 year was assessed with a food frequency questionnaire and was adjusted for energy intake. At the children's age of 6 years, we measured their body fat percentage (BF%), blood pressure (BP), and insulin, HDL cholesterol, and triglyceride serum levels. These measures were incorporated into a cardiometabolic risk factor score, using age- and sex-specific SD scores.

Results: In covariate-adjusted models, higher protein intake was associated with a higher BF%, lower diastolic BP, and lower triglyceride levels. We observed a significant interaction of protein intake with child sex on metabolic outcomes. Stratified analyses showed that protein intake was positively associated with BF% [0.07 SD (95 % CI 0.02; 0.13) per 10 g/day] and insulin levels in girls, but not in boys. In boys, but not in girls, higher protein intake was associated with lower triglyceride levels [-0.12 SD (95 % CI -0.20; -0.04) per 10 g/day] and a lower cardiometabolic risk factor score. Protein intake was not consistently associated with systolic BP or HDL cholesterol levels.

Conclusion: Protein intake in early childhood was associated with a higher BF% and higher insulin levels at 6 years in girls and with lower triglyceride levels in boys. Further studies are needed to explore these sex differences and to investigate whether the observed changes persist into adulthood.

Keywords: Blood pressure; Body fat; Children; Dietary protein; Epidemiology; Insulin.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors have no conflicts of interest relevant to this article to disclose. Ethical standard The study was approved by the Medical Ethics Committee of Erasmus Medical Center, Rotterdam, and all parents provided written informed consent.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Flowchart of study participants included for the main analysis
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Weiss R, Dziura J, Burgert TS, Tamborlane WV, Taksali SE, Yeckel CW, Allen K, Lopes M, Savoye M, Morrison J, Sherwin RS, Caprio S. Obesity and the metabolic syndrome in children and adolescents. N Engl J Med. 2004;350(23):2362–2374. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa031049. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Morrison JA, Friedman LA, Gray-McGuire C. Metabolic syndrome in childhood predicts adult cardiovascular disease 25 years later: the Princeton Lipid Research Clinics Follow-up Study. Pediatrics. 2007;120(2):340–345. doi: 10.1542/peds.2006-1699. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Morrison JA, Friedman LA, Wang P, Glueck CJ. Metabolic syndrome in childhood predicts adult metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes mellitus 25 to 30 years later. J Pediatr. 2008;152(2):201–206. doi: 10.1016/j.jpeds.2007.09.010. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Felix JF, Voortman T, van den Hooven EH, Sajjad A, Leermakers ET, Tharner A, Kiefte-de Jong JC, Duijts L, Verhulst FC, de Jongste JC, Tiemeier H, Hofman A, Rivadeneira F, Moll HA, Raat H, Jaddoe VW, Franco OH. Health in children: a conceptual framework for use in healthy ageing research. Maturitas. 2014;77(1):47–51. doi: 10.1016/j.maturitas.2013.09.011. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Altorf-van der Kuil W, Engberink MF, Brink EJ, van Baak MA, Bakker SJ, Navis G, van’t Veer P, Geleijnse JM. Dietary protein and blood pressure: a systematic review. PLoS ONE. 2010;5(8):e12102. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0012102. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

MeSH terms