title: Health consequences of childhood obesity.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To evaluate the cardiovascular and endocrine effects of childhood obesity as well as prevalence of metabolic syndrome associated with it.
  
  
  METHODS
  49 obese and overweight children aged between 6 and 11 years as study group and 45 healthy non-obese controls of same age were selected for the study. Both the groups were evaluated for height, weight, BMI, waist circumference, blood pressure, fasting serum lipid fractions, insulin level, fasting and post-prandial blood glucose and C-reactive protein. Screening for metabolic syndrome was performed following most acceptable criteria.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The study group children had significantly higher blood pressure, altered lipid fractions and high C-reactive Protein. Criteria-wise insulin resistance, hypertriglyceridemia and low high density lipoprotein also were found at significantly higher rate among obese children. The metabolic syndrome existed at a high prevalence of 14.1% in the study group.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Obesity in childhood causes cardiovascular and endocrine dysregulation with onset of insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome even in absence of significant evidence of hypertension and type 2 diabetes mellitus in this age group.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, Vivekananda Institute of Medical Sciences, Ramakrishna Mission Seva Pratishthan, 99, Sarat Bose Road, Kolkata, 700026 West Bengal, India. sahaanindya09@gmail.com
authors.forename: Anindya Kumar
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Saha
authors.forename: Neille
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Sarkar
authors.forename: Tapabrata
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Chatterjee
mesh_terms: D016022:Case-Control Studies; D002648:Child; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007194:India / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D024821:Metabolic Syndrome / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000517:prevention & control; D009765:Obesity / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000517:prevention & control; D015995:Prevalence; D012307:Risk Factors