Snapshots

Back to the future

Children seldom show obvious signs of coronary heart disease but, with an original clinical research study, University researchers are hoping to figure out factors that may lead to heart trouble later in their lives. The need is urgent because childhood obesity puts people at risk for heart disease in young adulthood. Obesity is not only more common but also more severe than in the past, says pediatric cardiologist Julia Steinberger.

She is piggybacking onto an earlier generation of subjects and adding the second generation of their children to determine predictors of childhood obesity risk factors to better prevent heart disease, high blood pressure and type 2 diabetes in adults. “Children grow up in the image of their parents,” Steinberger says. This ambitious study benefits from $2.4 million for 5 years from the National Institutes of Health, the enthusiasm of the first generation, and the work of earlier researchers.

The core of the research subjects group will be 250 people in their early 40s. They were enrolled in Minnesota elementary schools when they first had their blood pressure, body size, and such lifestyle factors such as TV habits studied by University of Minnesota researchers. They were followed yearly through high school and they came back to the U at age 24 for another checkup.

“They have a study identity,” Steinberger says of the group. “They are proud to participate.” Prior research study leads, such as pediatrician Alan Sinaiko, kept up relationships with these research subjects. Now adults, and most of them healthy, they may reveal risk factors for early heart disease, high blood pressure and type 2 diabetes. Public health researchers David Jacobs and Lyn Steffen, as well as pediatrics faculty Antoinette Moran, Donald Dengel, and Aaron Kelly also are working on this clinical research study.

To complete the two-generation study, the original study subjects will bring their children—up to 500 total—and the children’s other biological parent for a two-day evaluation. Once the 1,000 people have been evaluated, the team expects to find indicators of risk for becoming obese and developing early heart disease.

Steinberger says: “We will be able to establish some patterns in families,” patterns that will help predict which children are at greatest risk for developing heart disease. She believes that those thousand people taking part in the study will contribute to the possibility of better health for many more children in the future.