ESPE Abstracts

Context: Osteocalcin is a bone formation marker that has recently sparked interest for its endocrine involvement in glucose homeostasis and obesity. Nevertheless, its natural pattern during infancy and early childhood remains unknown.Objectives: We established reference values for total serum osteocalcin during specific timepoints from birth until five years of age, and presented these in the context of covariates.<p...

Objectives and Study: Insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I) regulates fetal and infant growth and is influenced by nutrition during infancy. Breast fed children have lower IGF-I levels than formula fed infants and the reason is partly explained by lower levels of protein and higher level of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) in breast milk compared to formula. Environmental factors, such as nutrition, have long-lasting influences on hormone secretion and on future metabolic hea...

Background: Growth patterns in early childhood are important for predicting adult overweight or obesity. BMI is the most widely used measure. However BMI does not reveal much regarding the distribution of fat, for example the visceral fat that in adults is highly correlated with metabolic risk. Waist-to-Height Ratio (WtHR) is in adults a better measure for visceral fat and studies indicate that the same applies to children.Objective and hypotheses: To st...