BODY COMPOSITION AND BLOOD PRESSURE IN BLACK PHILADELPHIA ADOLESCENTS

Abstract

It is well established that weight is positively associated with blood pressure (BP) and that overweight is a significant risk factor for elevated BP. However, determining the relative importance of fat and lean body mass in explaining this phenomenon requires further investigation. This study examines the association between height (ht) and weight (wt) and BP at 7 years and body composition variables and BP during adolescence, using a representative sample of 600 black children from Philadelphia. The variables from the adolescent data are wt, ht, upper arm muscle circumference, and skinfold thicknesses and were analyzed using a mixed longitudinal design. The results from the 7 year and adolescent data show that wt, ht, and corrected wt for ht are all significantly correlated with BP. However, wt is more highly related to BP than the other variables. Further analyses of the adolescent data indicate that in those age and sex groups in which wt explains a significant proportion of BP variance, lean body mass is generally a more important contributor to this association than fat body mass. For example, for 13 and 14 year old males, the results of multiple regression analysis show that muscle circumference is the important contributor in systolic BP (adjusted beta weights .46 and .33, p < .01). Particularly in young adolescent males, lean body mass appears to be the component of wt which is associated with systolic BP. This work was supported by NHLBI Grant #HL - 19869.

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