Ukmedix has seen a new study that shows that 50% of all adults who suffer from hypertension or high blood pressure had been overweight or obese when they were younger as children.

The connection between hypertension and metabolic syndrome is known and highlights risk issues of heart disease such as waistline fat and high blood pressure, low HDL cholesterol as well as high resting blood sugar levels and high triglyceride levels but previously no study had conclusively shown that high blood pressure and other metabolic disorders were connected to children being obese and overweight.

The findings come from Tulane University based in New Orleans and provides the best evidence yet of the causes of adult hypertension. Overall 3,200 people were looked at and put into groups from the age of 4 to 11 years, from 12 to 18 and from 19 to 42 years old and were carefully monitored. The study is part of the Bogalusa Heart Study that can claim to be the longest running study in the world of heart disease risk issues that start in children.

The study is important as it highlights the early progression of hypertension and shows how essential it is that children are kept at the right weight and not allowed to become obese. The long term effects of childhood obesity is clearly stressed in this research and it shows that by not getting to grips early with obesity could cause many more health problems in the future.