The research, conducted at Barts and the London and Newham University Hospital Trusts, confirms that 95 per cent of these children are overweight or obese. The study also found that all but one of the children come from black and minority ethnic (BME) groups. Type 2 diabetes tends to develop sooner in people of BME origin and the prevalence is at least five times higher.

Douglas Smallwood, Chief Executive at Diabetes UK said, These cases in East London confirm a shocking trend that Type 2 diabetes in children is increasing. Diabetes can lead to long term complications such as heart disease, blindness, kidney failure and reduced life expectancy. Unless children are educated to eat a healthy diet and take up physical activity the number of children with the condition will continue to increase. Specialist diabetes services for children are already under a lot of pressure. If this problem is getting worse, the NHS has to ensure resources are in place to deal with it.

diabetes/

For women who have a waistline exceeding 88 cm and triglycerides exceeding 1.45 mmol/L at the same time, diet- and exercise-induced weight loss is highly recommended to reduce the almost five-fold increased risk for dying of cardiovascular disease compared with those who do not possess these risk factors or indicators, he said. Although it sounds simple and repetitive, we believe this is the most effective way of eliminating the source of the problem. Luckily, upper-body fat mass responds relatively rapidly to diet and exercise changes. The challenge is to maintain these achieved benefits and obtain lasting prevention.

The findings add to previous work by Danish researchers indicating that body weight or body mass index by itself may not be as important in assessing atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease risk as the pattern of fat accumulation.

However, in an accompanying editorial, Michael Criqui, M.D., M.P.H., professor of family and preventive medicine at the University of California, San Diego, said the EWET model proved to be a strong predictor because it focuses on high triglycerides. He notes that the NCEP definition of metabolic syndrome uses a triglyceride cutoff point of 150 mg/dL while the EWET used a lower cutoff point of 128 mg/dL. While the EWET model requires a woman to have both an enlarged waist and elevated triglycerides, the NCEP metabolic syndrome definition allows for normal values for any two of the five risk factors.

What the EWET definition does is include all women with the highest risk component, triglycerides, while the NCEP metabolic syndrome definition doesn ™t, he said.

Criqui suggested that triglycerides, HDL and blood pressure be measured along with other independent CVD risk factors to provide the best estimate of CVD risk.

Tanko ™s co-authors are Yu Z. Bagger, M.D.; Gerong Qin, M.D.; Peter Alexandersen, M.D.; Philip J. Larsen, M.D., Ph.D. and Claus Christiansen, M.D.

americanheart