Background and aims: The increase in overweight and obese children may be linked to increased rates of dyslipidaemia. The aim was to assess the prevalence of dyslipidaemia and associated risk factors among the Northern Mexican child population.
Methods and results: Four hundred and fifty-one subjects aged between 2 and 10 (47.5% girls) took part in the Nuevo León State Survey of Nutrition and Health 2011-2012. According to the 2011 Expert Panel on Integrated Guidelines for Cardiovascular Health and Risk Reduction in Children and Adolescents, serum lipid levels (mg/dL) were categorized into three subgroups (acceptable, borderline-high/low or high/low) as follows: TChol: acceptable <170, borderline-high 170-199, high ≥200; LDL-chol: acceptable <110, borderline-high 110-129, high ≥130; non-HDL-chol: acceptable <120, borderline-high 120-144, high ≥145; HDL-chol: acceptable >45, borderline-low 40-45, low <40; and TG: acceptable <75, borderline-high 75-99, high ≥100 in ≤9 year-old children, and acceptable <90, borderline-high 90-129, and high ≥130 in 10 year-old children. The overall prevalence of borderline-high + high TG, non-HDL-chol, TChol, and LDL-chol was 63.0%, 44.1%, 43.5%, and 29.9%, respectively. The overall prevalence of borderline-low + low HDL-chol was 46.3%. The overall frequency of dyslipidaemia was 54.3%. Thirteen children (2.9%) had all five symptoms of dyslipidaemia. The most common dyslipidaemia was high TG in combination (26.2%) and in isolation (10.6%).
Conclusions: Half of the children had at least one abnormal lipid concentration. A high TG level was the most frequent dyslipidaemia. Obesity was associated with the occurrence of at least one abnormal lipid level. These findings emphasize the need to pay further attention to the prevention of cardiovascular disease and obesity from an early age.