Journal of obesity
Early-Life Predictors of Obesity and High Blood Pressure Comorbidity at Midlife: Findings From the 1958 National Child Development Study (NCDS)
By Stannard S, Owen RK, Berrington A and 5 others.
Abstract
Background
Early-life exposures can increase the risk of both obesity and high blood pressure in adulthood. In this paper, we identify exposures across five pre-hypothesised childhood domains, explore them as predictors of obesity and high blood pressure comorbidity using the 1958 National Child Development Study (NCDS), and discuss these results in comparison to a similar approach using another birth cohort (1970 British Cohort Study (BCS70)).
Methods
The analytical sample included 9150 participants. The outcome was obesity (BMI of ≥ 30) and high blood pressure (blood pressure > 140/90 mm Hg) comorbidity at age 44. Domains included: 'prenatal, antenatal, neonatal and birth', 'developmental attributes and behaviour', 'education and academic ability', 'socioeconomic factors' and 'parental and family environment'. Stepwise backward elimination selected variables for inclusion for each domain, and predicted risk scores of obesity-high blood pressure for each cohort member within each domain were calculated. We performed multivariable logistic regression analysis including domain-specific risk scores, sex and ethnicity to assess how well the outcome could be predicted taking all domains into account. In additional analysis, we included potential adult factors.