ESPE Abstracts

Background: Cardiovascular disease is one of the most prominent causes of mortality world widely. A key related factor of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease is the presence of dyslipidemia. Together with elevated blood pressure, obesity, and diabetes mellitus, dyslipidemia is a component of metabolic syndrome and associated with an increasing incidence of coronary heart disease.

Objective and hypotheses: The aim of this study was to investigate the concentration of non-HDL cholesterol in Chinese Han students of varying ages and genders, and to find out its related factors.

Methods: We examined 20 208 Han students (10 573 boys and 9635 girls) aged between 6 and 17 years old who came from six districts throughout China. The examination, performed during 2009–2010, involved a clinical examination and self-administered questionnaire. Based on the criteria defined by the American Academy of Pediatrics for children and adolescents in 2011, we defined high non-HDL cholesterol (total cholesterol minus HDL cholesterol) at a level ≥3.75 mmol/l. We set gender, age, obesity, physical activities, sleep duration, eating patterns and sedentary activities as related factors and performed logistic regression analysis.

Result: The percentage of high non-HDL cholesterol was 4.1% in 6–17 years old children and adolescents in China. Non-HDL cholesterol concentration was significantly higher in girls than boys. Biological maturity was positively associated with non-HDL cholesterol concentration. Gender, weekly sport frequency, eating patterns, biological maturity and obesity were the related factors of high non-HDL cholesterol concentrations.

Conclusion: The concentrations of non-HDL cholesterol in children and adolescents are strongly determined by gender. Obesity, gender and biological maturity contributed to the variance in non-HDL cholesterol and should be considered in future evaluation of non-HDL cholesterol status. Children and adolescents who did more sports and ate more vegetables were less likely to have a higher non-HDL cholesterol level.