ArticleEuropean journal of pediatrics2026
Childhood body mass index trajectories and risk of overweight and obesity in young adulthood: a population-based prospective cohort study.
Article in European journal of pediatrics, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Childhood body mass index (BMI) change is associated with obesity in adulthood but is often investigated in isolated age windows. This study aimed to identify age windows of BMI changes that are associated with overweight, including obesity, in young adulthood. This study was embedded in a population-based, prospective cohort study among 3528 participants born in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, between 2002 and 2006. Data on gestational-age-adjusted birth weight and sex- and age-adjusted BMI (BMI-SDS) was repeatedly collected between 2 and 20 years in a dedicated research center. Associations between childhood BMI-SDS and young adult (from 17 to 21 years of age) BMI-SDS and overweight/obesity were analyzed. Of children with overweight, including obesity, at 2, 6, 10, and 14 years, 32.6%, 54.0%, 57.4%, and 70.3%, respectively, had overweight around 18 years of age. Positive deviations from the expected BMI at any age were positively associated with odds of overweight at 18, with the strongest effect estimate at 6 years (p-values < 0.05). Of children in the highest BMI tertile between 2 and 10 years, only those with BMI growth deceleration, defined as a decrease comparable to crossing a major percentile line on a growth chart, between 2 and 6 years did not have increased risk of overweight at 18 years, whereas all other children in the highest BMI tertile did.
conclusionOptimizing healthy and reversing unhealthy BMI trajectories in early childhood, especially before 6 years, may be a great opportunity for the prevention of overweight and obesity. WHAT IS KNOWN: • Childhood growth and body mass index (BMI) are strongly related to obesity in adulthood. • Rapid weight gain in infancy, early childhood, and adolescence has all been found to be associated with risk of obesity in both childhood and adulthood. WHAT IS NEW: • Based on repeated growth data of 3,528 children from a prospective cohort, associations of childhood BMI with young adult BMI are strongest around age 6, compared to ages 2, 10, and 14 years old. • The increased risk of adult overweight/obesity in children in the highest BMI tertile was attenuated in those with growth deceleration before 6 years. After this age, regardless of growth velocity, risk remained increased for children in the highest BMI tertile.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.