Association between cardiovascular risk factors and carotid intima-media thickness in prepubertal Brazilian children.

Background: Early exposure to cardiovascular risk factors creates a chronic inflammatory state that could damage the endothelium followed by thickening of the carotid intima-media.

Objective: To investigate the association of cardiovascular risk factors and thickening of the carotid intima.

Methods: Media in prepubertal children. In this cross-sectional study, carotid intima-media thickness (cIMT) and cardiovascular risk factors were assessed in 129 prepubertal children aged from 5 to 10 year. Association was assessed by simple and multivariate logistic regression analyses.

Results: In simple logistic regression analyses, body mass index (BMI) z-score, waist circumference, and systolic blood pressure (SBP) were positively associated with increased left, right, and average cIMT, whereas diastolic blood pressure was positively associated only with increased left and average cIMT (p<0.05). In multivariate logistic regression analyses increased left cIMT was positively associated to BMI z-score and SBP, and increased average cIMT was only positively associated to SBP (p<0.05).

Conclusions: BMI z-score and SBP were the strongest risk factors for increased cIMT.