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. 2018 Jul 25;18(1):245.
doi: 10.1186/s12887-018-1224-6.

Incidence of obesity and its predictors in children and adolescents in 10 years of follow up: Tehran lipid and glucose study (TLGS)

Maryam Barzin  1 , Shayan Aryannezhad  1 , Sara Serahati  1 , Akram Beikyazdi  1 , Fereidoun Azizi  2 , Majid Valizadeh  1 , Maryam Ziadlou  1 , Farhad Hosseinpanah  3
Affiliations

Incidence of obesity and its predictors in children and adolescents in 10 years of follow up: Tehran lipid and glucose study (TLGS)

Maryam Barzin et al. BMC Pediatr. .

Abstract

Background: Childhood obesity is one of the most challenging public health issues of twenty-first century. While we know that there is an increase in prevalence of childhood and adolescence obesity, incidence studies must be carried out. The main objective of this study was to determine childhood obesity incidence and its potential predictors in Tehranian urban population.

Methods: This study was conducted within the framework of the Tehran Lipid and Glucose Study (TLGS), addressing incidence and risk factors of obesity throughout several phases from 1999-2001 to 2009-2011 among Tehranian urban population. Total study subjects were 1033 non-obese children, aged between 7 to 11 years, with a median 8.7 years of follow-up. Body mass Index (BMI) was used to define obesity and overweight based on World Health Organization (WHO) criteria, and definition of metabolic syndrome (MetS) for children was based on the Cook survey. Cumulative incidence of obesity and obesity incidence rates were calculated for each gender. Cox proportional hazard models was used to estimate potential risk factors of obesity.

Results: Our Participants had a mean age of 9.2 ± 1.4 years, mean BMI of 16.1 ± 2.2 kg/m2 and mean waist circumference (WC) of 57.2 ± 6.7 at baseline. Total cumulative incidence of obesity was calculated to be 17%, CI =14.1-20.4 for whole population (19.6%, CI =15.4-24.8 for boys and 14.5%,CI = 10.9-19.1 for girls). Participants which were in the age group of 7-9 years at baseline experienced higher rate of cumulative obesity incidence compared to those who were in the age group of 10-11 years at baseline (22% vs 10.8%). In addressing risk factors, 5 parameters were significantly associated with obesity incidence: being overweight at baseline (HR = 14.93 95%CI: 9.82-22.70), having higher WC (HR = 5.05 95%CI: 3.01-8.48), suffering from childhood MetS (HR: 2.77 95%CI: 1.57-4.89) and having a obese father (HR: 2.69 95%CI: 1.61-4.50) or mother (HR: 3.04 95%CI: 1.96-4.72).

Conclusion: Incidence of obesity is significantly high in Tehranian children, especially the age group 7-9 years. Best predictors of childhood obesity incidence are childhood overweight, WC above 90th percentile, childhood MetS and parental obesity.

Keywords: Adolescents; Childhood; Incidence; Obesity; Predictors.

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Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

At the beginning of this study, all participants (if age above 18 yrars) or parents or legal guardian (if age under 18 years) provided written informed consent. This study has been approved by the National Research Council of the Islamic Republic of Iran (No. 121) and has been performed with the approval of the Human Research Review Committee of the Endocrine Research Center, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interest.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Flow chart of inclusion and exclusions of study participants
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Kaplan-Meier Curve for cumulative incidence of obesity; a Stratified by gender, b Stratified by different age groups, c Stratified by different age groups of boys, d Stratified by different age groups of girls
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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