Background: This study aimed to examine the association between physical activity (PA) and a total cardio metabolic risk (CMR) score in children aged 3–12 years. Secondary objectives were to examine the association between PA and individual CMR factors. Methods: A longitudinal study with repeated measures was conducted with participants from a large primary care practice-based research network in Toronto, Canada. Mixed effects models were used to examine the relationship between parent-reported physical activity and outcome variables (total CMR score, triglycerides, glucose, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, systolic blood pressure, waist circumference, weight-to-height ratio, and non-high-density lipoprotein cholesterol). Results: Data from 1885 children (6.06 y, 54.4% male) with multiple visits (n = 2670) were included in the analyses. For every unit increase of 60 minutes of PA, there was no evidence of an association with total CMR score (adjusted: −0.02 [−0.014 to 0.004], P = .11]. For the individual CMR components, there was evidence of a weak association between PA and systolic blood pressure (−0.01 [−0.03 to −0.01], P < .001) and waist-to-height ratio (−0.81 [−1.62 to −0.003], P < .001). Conclusion: Parent-reported PA among children aged 3–12 years was not statistically associated with total CMR, but was weakly associated with systolic blood pressure and waist-to-height ratio.
Association of Physical Activity and Cardiometabolic Risk in Children 3–12 Years
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Vanderloo, Parkin, Borkhoff, and Birken are with Child Health Evaluative Sciences, The Hospital for Sick Children Research Institute, Toronto, ON, Canada. Maguire and Dai are with the Applied Health Research Centre of the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute, St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada. Maguire and Parkin are also with the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, Dalla Lana School of PublicHealth; and the Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine; University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada. Maguire is also with the Department of Pediatrics, St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada. Parkin is also with the Division of Pediatric Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, The Hospital for Sick Children, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada. Tremblay is with Healthy Active Living and Obesity Research, CHEO Research Institute, Ottawa, ON, Canada. Anderson is with the Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada. Birken is also with the School of Dalla Lana Public Health, Epidemiology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.
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