ESPE Abstracts

Background: Childhood obesity is a serious public health concern. To identify risk for obesity in early childhood is important.Objective: To analyse association of pre-pregnancy maternal weight with BMI and metabolic profile at 4 years.Methods: 2604 pregnant mothers and 1960 children from the Spanish population-based cohort study Environment and Childhood (INfancia y Medio Ambiente) Project (INMA). Research protocol was approved by...

Background: Childhood obesity predisposes to metabolic disorders. Low grade inflammation of adipose tissue (AT) associated with macrophage infiltration may lead to metabolic complications. Two macrophage activation states M1 (pro-inflammatory) and M2 (anti-inflammatory) exist in AT with surface markers CD40 (M1), CD206 (M2) and CD163 (M2). M1 polarization correlates with metabolic complications.Objective and hypotheses: To study the expression of CD40, C...

Background and aims: Fat and bone are linked by a multitude of pathways supporting a skeleton appropriate for the mass of adipose tissue of the organism. We aimed to investigate the relations of adipose tissue hormones such as leptin, adiponectin, retinol-binding-protein-4 (RBP-4) and lipocalin-2 along with the low grade inflammation marker hs-CRP with markers of bone metabolism such as osteoprotegerin (OPG), receptor-activator of NF-κB ligand (RANKL), osteocalcin, C-term...

Background: Although metabolically obese normal weight (MONW) adults are at increased risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease (CVD), little is known regarding MONW children.Objective and hypotheses: To characterize lifestyle habits and insulin dynamics of MONW children.Method: Caucasian youth (n=630) aged 8–10 years, with at least one obese biological parent, were studied (QUALITY cohort). We defined MONW c...

Background: IDF-2007 MS definition (MS-IDF2007) for children and adolescents has been challenged frequently in clinical practice and should be improved further. Therefore, it becomes imminent to explore an accessible and effective tool to screen obese children with the metabolic syndrome components.Objective and hypotheses: To investigate the optimal cut-off values and compare the accuracy for the triglycerides and HDL cholesterol ratio and homeostasis m...

Background: Obesity is a metabolic disorder associated with increased PAI-1 levels in the circulation. This increase is related to insulin resistance and cardiovascular disease (CVD). In adults the relationship between plasma PAI-1 levels and the 4G/5G gene polymorphism in the PAI-1 gene has been demonstrated, but few data exist in children.Objective and hypotheses: To assess the relationship between PAI-1 plasma levels and the PAI-1 4G allele gene polym...

Background: Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor (VEGF) is largely produced by adipose tissue and is an important regulator of physiological and pathological angiogenesis in adults with obesity.Objective and hypotheses: To determine the nature of VEGF production and its connection to the formation of vascular complications in patients with childhood obesity.Method: In 87 children (42 boys and 45 girls) 9–17 years old with obesit...

Background: There is growing evidence of a correlation between fat and bone metabolism at both the clinical and molecular levels, although the systemic regulators have not been clearly identified. The receptor activator of nuclear factor kB ligand (RANKL) and its soluble decoy receptor, osteoprotegerin (OPG), are involved in bone resorption and vascular calcification. OPG levels has been related with insulin resistance in adult obese subjects.Objective a...

Background: The 6-min walk test (6MWT) is a simple, accurate and safe method to measure functional exercise capacity. The 6MWT is increasingly used in children to predict morbidity and mortality from cardiopulmonary disease, to assess functional capacity and measure disease progression in chronic childhood conditions such as muscular dystrophy.Objective and hypotheses: To provide smooth reference curves for the 6-min walk distance (6MWD) in healthy child...

Background: Weight status in children is commonly defined using BMI (SDS), but this measure is problematic due to the skewness of the BMI distribution and its age-dependant increase. In addition, it is difficult for physicians or parents alike to grasp what a certain value means. Excess body weight (EBW) is frequently used in adult patients in the context of bariatric surgery.Objective and hypotheses: An appropriate definition for the paediatric populati...

Background: The theory of ‘Metabolically healthy obese individuals’ is become very popular in researchers across the world. Nevertheless, obese persons are at increased risk for adverse long-term outcomes compared with metabolically healthy normal-weight individuals.Objective: To determine the obesity-related cardiovascular comorbidities in metabolically healthy obese adolescents comparatively to lean and metabolically unhealthy ones.<p cla...

Background: Cardiovascular diseases are most relevant for morbidity and mortality in obese patients. Because metabolic complications already start in childhood obesity one may expect an early manifestation of cardiovascular disease in this group as young adults. In adults fetuin A was shown to promote adipocyte inflammation and metabolic syndrome and subsequently vascular damage.Objective and hypotheses: We evaluated the role of fetuin A in the vascular ...