title: Percent body fat and chronic disease risk factors in U.S. children and youth.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The dramatic increase in pediatric obesity has renewed interest in accurate methods and screening indexes for identifying at-risk children and youth. Whether age-specific standards are needed is a factor that remains uncertain.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  This study was designed to describe the age-specific fatness-risk factor relationship in boys and girls across a wide age range.
  
  
  METHODS
  Data were from 12,279 white, black, and Mexican-American children and adolescents from the National Health and Nutritional Examination Surveys (NHANES) III (1998-1994) and IV (1999-2004). Children were grouped based on percent fat, estimated from subscapular and triceps skinfolds, and the age-specific relationships between percent fat and chronic disease risk factors (e.g., blood pressure, lipids and lipoprotein levels, glucose, insulin, and circulating C-reactive protein levels) were described in boys and girls, aged 6-18 years.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Percent fat was significantly related to risk factor levels. At higher levels of percent fat, the prevalence of adverse cardiovascular disease risk factors was higher, particularly above 20% fat in boys and above 30% fat in girls. In boys and girls, the interaction term age by percent fat was a significant predictor of risk factors, whereas the percent fat by race interaction term was nonsignificant.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The results demonstrate a strong relationship between chronic disease risk factors and percent fat in children and youth that varies by age in boys and girls.
authors.affiliation: Department of Nutritional Sciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona 85721, USA. going@u.arizona.edu
authors.forename: Scott B
authors.initials: SB
authors.lastname: Going
authors.forename: Timothy G
authors.initials: TG
authors.lastname: Lohman
authors.forename: Ellen C
authors.initials: EC
authors.lastname: Cussler
authors.forename: Daniel P
authors.initials: DP
authors.lastname: Williams
authors.forename: John A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Morrison
authors.forename: Paul S
authors.initials: PS
authors.lastname: Horn
mesh_terms: D000273:Adipose Tissue; D000293:Adolescent; D001741:Black or African American / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D017677:Age Distribution; D000367:Age Factors; D015992:Body Mass Index; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D002908:Chronic Disease / Q000453:epidemiology*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008403:Mass Screening; D017058:Mexican Americans / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012372:ROC Curve; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012307:Risk Factors; D012737:Sex Factors; D012885:Skinfold Thickness; D044465:White People / Q000706:statistics & numerical data