Body mass index trajectories during infancy and pediatric obesity at 6 years

Area of Science:

• Pediatrics
• Public Health
• Growth Monitoring

Background:

• Childhood obesity is a significant public health concern.
• Early life factors, including body mass index (BMI) trajectories, may influence later obesity risk.
• Understanding infant BMI patterns can inform early intervention strategies.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the association between infant body mass index (BMI) trajectories and the risk of obesity at age 6 years.
• To identify distinct patterns of BMI change during the first year of life.
• To determine if specific BMI trajectories predict later obesity development.

Main Methods:

• Utilized data from 1169 children with multiple BMI measurements in the first year of life.
• Employed latent class growth analysis to identify infant BMI trajectories.
• Used logistic regression to assess the link between identified trajectories and obesity at age 6.

Main Results:

• Identified three infant BMI trajectories: low stable (80.2%), high stable (16.9%), and rising (2.8%).
• The high-stable trajectory group had the highest prevalence of obesity at age 6 (17.2%).
• Children with a high-stable trajectory showed a 1.79 times higher odds of obesity at age 6 compared to the low-stable group.

Conclusions:

• A high-stable BMI trajectory during infancy is associated with an increased risk of obesity at age 6.
• While indicating higher risk, the high-stable trajectory demonstrated low accuracy in pinpointing children who would be obese at age 6.
• Further research may be needed to refine predictive models for childhood obesity based on early life growth patterns.