Fitness, food, and biomarkers: Characterizing body composition in 19634 early adolescents
File(s)
Published version
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Adolescent obesity persists as a major concern, especially in Central and Eastern Europe, yet evidence gaps exist regarding the pivotal early adolescent years. Our objective was to provide a comprehensive picture using a holistic approach of measured anthropometry in early adolescence, including body composition, cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF), and reported lifestyle characteristics. We aimed to elucidate potential sex/gender differences throughout and associations to biomarkers of disease risk for obese adolescents. Methods: Trained nurses measured 19,634 early adolescents (12–14-year-olds), we collected parental reports, and, for obese adolescents, fasting blood samples in four major Polish cities using a cross-sectional developmental design. Results: 24.7% boys and 18.6% girls were overweight/obese, and 2886 had BMI ≥ 90th percentile. With increasing age, there was greater risk of obesity among boys (p for trend = 0.001) and a decreasing risk of thinness for girls (p for trend = 0.01). Contrary to debate, we found BMI (continuous) was a useful indicator of measured fat mass (FM). There were 38.6% with CRF in the range of poor/very poor and was accounted for primarily by FM in boys, rather than BMI, and systolic blood pressure in girls. Boys, in comparison to girls, engaged more in sports (t = 127.26, p < 0.0001) and consumed more fast food (t = 188.57, p < 0.0001) and sugar-sweetened beverages (167.46, p < 0.0001). Uric acid, a potential marker for prediabetes, was strongly related to BMI in the obese subsample for both boys and girls. Obese girls showed signs of undernutrition. Conclusion: these findings show that overweight/obesity is by far a larger public health problem than thinness in early adolescence and is characterized differentially by sex/gender. Moreover, poor CRF in this age, which may contribute to life course obesity and disease, highlights the need for integrated and personalized intervention strategies taking sex/gender into account.
Date Issued
2022-03-25
Date Acceptance
2022-03-22
Citation
Nutrients, 2022, 14 (7)
ISSN
2072-6643
Publisher
MDPI AG
Journal / Book Title
Nutrients
Volume
14
Issue
7
Copyright Statement
© 2022 by the authors.
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
This article is an open access article
distributed under the terms and
conditions of the Creative Commons
Attribution (CC BY) license (https://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/
4.0/).
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
This article is an open access article
distributed under the terms and
conditions of the Creative Commons
Attribution (CC BY) license (https://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/
4.0/).
License URL
Subjects
Science & Technology
Life Sciences & Biomedicine
Nutrition & Dietetics
adiposity
adolescents
anthropometry
body mass index
fat mass
lifestyle
junk food
obesity
sex differences
PoZdro!
undernutrition
Central and Eastern Europe
MASS INDEX
CARDIORESPIRATORY FITNESS
SEXUAL-MATURATION
PHYSICAL-ACTIVITY
LIFE-COURSE
OBESITY
OVERWEIGHT
CHILDREN
PREVALENCE
CHILDHOOD
Central and Eastern Europe
PoZdro!
adiposity
adolescents
anthropometry
body mass index
fat mass
junk food
lifestyle
obesity
sex differences
undernutrition
Adolescent
Biomarkers
Body Composition
Body Mass Index
Cross-Sectional Studies
Female
Humans
Male
Overweight
Pediatric Obesity
Thinness
Humans
Thinness
Body Mass Index
Cross-Sectional Studies
Body Composition
Adolescent
Female
Male
Overweight
Pediatric Obesity
Biomarkers
0908 Food Sciences
1111 Nutrition and Dietetics
Publication Status
Published
Article Number
ARTN 1369
Date Publish Online
2022-03-25