The global childhood obesity epidemic threatens future health due to a rise in cardiovascular disease. There is a need for identifying subclinical organ damage (SOD) markers when evaluating cardiovascular risk in the young since hard end points does not/rarely exist among adolescents. Aortic pulse wave velocity (aPWV) is an established marker of SOD in adults. Furthermore, studies on adults have shown that obesity is correlated with a higher aPWV. It is uncertain whether this relationship is manifest already in the young since high aPWV is regarded as a measure of chronic change to the vasculature. The present study asses aPWV in a cross-sectional survey where 100 obese children and adolescents, median age 12,7 years (range 10,1 to 18,9) are compared with 50 healthy gender and age matched individuals, median 12,9 years (10,3 to 17,9). Mean aPWV (SD; 95% CI) were in the obese group 4.52 m/s (0.53; 4.42 to 4.62) and in the control group 4.32 m/s (0.50; 4.17 to 4.47). Preliminary unadjusted results analysed by unpaired t-test, shows that obese individuals have a higher aPWV of 0.2007 m/s compared with the control group (P= 0.0338, 95% CI: 0.39 to 0.02). When analysing data in correspondence with a European normal material obese children had an aPWV standard deviation score in the normal range for age and height although higher than the control group in the present study.

This study shows that obesity is correlated to a higher aPWV although this effect may disappear after adjustment for possible confounders.