Overweight, asthma symptoms, atopy and pulmonary function in children of 4–12 years of age: findings from the SCAALA cohort in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the association between overweight and the occurrence of asthma and atopy in a cohort of children of 4-12 years of age living in the city of Salvador in 2005. Design: Cross-sectional study nested in a cohort. Setting: The metropolitan region of Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. Subjects: The study included 1129 children of 4-12 years age who presented complete information on the variables used here. Skin tests for allergy, spirometry, faecal parasitology, serum IgE and anthropometric surveys were conducted. Poisson's multivariate regression was adopted. Results: Wheezing was found in 29?1% and asthma in 22?8 % of children, both conditions being more common in those under 6 years of age and 34 % more common in overweight children (prevalence ratio (PR) 5 1?34; 95 % CI 1?07, 1?67) following adjustment. The ratio between forced expiratory volume in 1 s and forced vital capacity was associated with overweight (PR 5 1?35; 95 % CI 1?11, 1?61). No statistically significant association was found between overweight and allergen-specific IgE or with wheezing. Conclusions: These results are in agreement with the hypothesis that overweight is associated with asthma and pulmonary function, even following adjustment for intervening variables known to be associated with the pathogeny of asthma.

Association between eating patterns and body mass index in a sample of children and adolescents in Northeastern Brazil

“…The prevalence of excess weight found here (17.3%) is higher than the one found in other studies in Salvador 39 , or in studies conducted in Corumbá in Mato Grosso do Sul State (6.5% obese; 6.2% overweight) 40 and Table 2 Distribution of the factor loadings for the food consumption patterns of 6-to 12-year-old children and adolescents enrolled in the public school system of São Francisco do Conde, Bahia State, Brazil, 2010. Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais State (3.1% obese; 8.4% overweight) 41 .…”

Ratio of waist circumference to chest circumference is inversely associated with lung function in Chinese children and adolescents

“…The discrepancy between these studies is possibly due to several factors: (i) the independent variables were different; CC was introduced into the model in the present study but was not used in the study of Chen et al . ; (ii) air pollution; during at least the last three decades, economic development in China has been very rapid, resulting in serious air pollution, which has possibly caused a decrease in lung function, as suggested by previous studies; 10,11 (iii) undiagnosed asthma; some subjects with undiagnosed asthma may be obese or overweight, which may contribute to decreased lung function; 12–14 (iv) differences in fat distribution among different races; regardless of whether the population studied is children or adults and given the condition of roughly equal BMI, Asians tend to have a higher percentage of body fat and a tendency to more central obesity than White people 15–20 ; and (v) puberty; the development of puberty may be relatively delayed in Chinese compared with White children. The reasons for this may differ from those mentioned previously and may include socioeconomic factors, which need be further explored.…”

Toxocara Seropositivity, Atopy and Wheezing in Children Living in Poor Neighbourhoods in Urban Latin American

“…The following potential confounders were considered: body mass index (BMI), maternal educational level, parental asthma, parental smoking, household connection to the municipal sewage system, living on a paved street, frequency of garbage collection, number of siblings, the presence of cat(s) and/or dog(s) in the house, the presence of mould or dampness on the walls of the house (by inspection), the presence of cockroach and rodents at home, attendance at day-care centre and period of attendance, and presence of A. lumbricoides and T. trichiura infections in stool samples. These variables were selected because they were associated with seropositivity to Toxocara or atopy or asthma in univariate analyses (Table 1) or because they had been identified as confounders in a previous analysis using data from these children [34]. To build multivariate logistic regression models, we used a procedure in which step-wise forward selection of variables was performed.…”