Blood pressure percentiles by age and height for non-overweight Chinese children and adolescents: analysis of the china health and nutrition surveys 1991–2009

Abstract

BackgroundHypertension is an important health problem in China and raised blood pressure in children may lead to future hypertension. Accordingly we aimed to provide a reference blood pressure table for age, gender and height in Chinese children.MethodsA reference sample of subjects was drawn from the Chinese Health and National Survey 1999–2009 aged 7–17 years after excluding overweight and obese children, the 50th, 90th and 95th percentiles of systolic and diastolic blood pressure (SBP and DBP)are presented corrected for height and age by gender. These values are compared with existing Chinese and US recommendations.ResultsResults for the 50th, 90th and 95th percentile of SBP and DBP for 6245 boys and 5707 girls were presented by age and height percentiles. These observations were lower than existing Chinese recommendations before 13 years of age at median heightbut went higher in those >13 years old. At same age and height, SBP levels of American children were overall higher than Chinese counterparts from this study by average 9–10 mm Hg, but DBP did not show overall or significant difference.ConclusionsThe first height-specific blood pressure reference values are proposed for Chinese children and adolescents aged 7–17 years. These are lower than existing US reference values and current Chinese cutoffs.

Oscillometric blood pressure by age and height for non overweight children and adolescents in Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of Congo

“…This study presents the first BP threshold percentiles for children and adolescents of normal weight aged 3–17 years in Lubumbashi (DRC), computed by age and height simultaneously, by using an improved statistical method named GAMLSS provided in the package of R software [14, 16, 19]. The BP percentiles were established on the basis of oscillometric measurements of the BP with a device clinically validated in children: the Datascope Accutorr Plus [21].…”

“…Different percentiles of SBP and DBP (50th and 90th percentiles) for boys and girls, were compared with references percentiles of the German Health Interview and Examination Survey for Children and Adolescents (KIGGS) [14], the Elaboration of the Ranks of Reference Arterial Blood Pressure for the Population of Children and Adolescents in Poland (OLAF) [15] and the Chinese reference that used data from the China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS) [16]. This comparison was made for the different ages in relation to the target population of these studies (3–17 years for KIGGS and 7–17 years for OLAF and CHNS).…”

“…BP references or standards are not available for Congolese children in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) but there are many others [1, 2, 14–16] that do not correspond to our pediatric population.…”

Hypertension Screening Using Blood Pressure to Height Ratio

“…The gender, age, and height percentile-specific BP references have been widely accepted as the main tool for diagnosis of pediatric hypertension. [5][6][7] However, this method is too complicated and timeconsuming to be used by clinicians, nonclinical health professionals, and children or their parents or guardians. In addition, the complicated tables often lead to undiagnosed hypertension in pediatric population.…”

“…In China, 2 diagnostic criteria for childhood hypertension have been established recently, which also used the similar BP algorithm. 6,7 This algorithm is too complex to be applied in clinical practice, and it is even more difficult for use by nonmedical professionals or children and their parents or guardians. In addition, hypertension in children is usually underdiagnosed in the outpatient clinics, mainly because of the complexity of the BP algorithm.…”