Adolescent ; Adolescent Development ; Child ; Child Development ; China ; epidemiology ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Obesity ; epidemiology ; Prevalence

Objective To study the prevalence and characteristics of blood pressure (BP) among children and adolescents at normal weight but with abdominal obesity.Methods Using data from the ‘Student physical fitness and health surveillance 2010 project' in Shandong province,a total of 38 816 students aged 7-17 years were selected to participate in this study.Stature,body weight,waist circumference (WC),systolic blood pressure (SBP) and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) of these subjects were measured.Body weight status and abdominal obesity were defined by body mass index (BMI) and WC,respectively.Results In total,the proportions of thinness,normal weight,overweight and obesity defined by BMI were 5.37％,72.47％,12.92％ and 9.24％ respectively.5.86％ of the children and adolescents with normal weight had abdominal obesity,with normal weighted girls (7.19％) having higher prevalence of abdominal obesity than boys (4.33％) (P＜0.01).The Z-scores of SBP and DBP for both boys and girls were all significantly higher in the normal weight but with abdominal obesity groups than in both normal weight and WC groups (P＜0.01).Conclusion Children and adolescents under normal weight but with abdominal obesity had higher BP level need to be identified and considered as high-risk individuals.Related intervention programs should also be targeted to this population.