Prevalence of overweight and risk factors associated with obesity and metabolic syndrome among adolescents in a tertiary hospital in the Federal District

OBJECTIVE: To assess the prevalence of obesity and metabolic syndrome, as well as their respective risk factors, in adolescents attending a reference service in the Federal District. METHOD: The sample consisted of 47 adolescents aged 10 to 17 years. Nutritional status was classified using the body mass index (BMI) for age established by the World Health Organization. RESULTS: The sample consisted of 47 adolescents, of whom 23 (48.94%) were eutrophic, 12 (25.53%) were overweight, 8 (17.02%) were obese, and 4 (8.51%) were underweight. Among them, 21.28% had abdominal obesity, and 38.30% had high blood pressure. Of the 32 adolescents who underwent laboratory tests, the following average results were obtained: blood glucose of 87.27 mg/dL, total cholesterol of 154.09 mg/dL, HDL of 47.87 mg/dL, and triglycerides of 71.52 mg/dL. Metabolic syndrome was not diagnosed in any of the participants, but obesity and other risk factors were identified, such as increased waist circumference and hypertension. All obese adolescents had at least one risk factor present. CONCLUSION: No cases of metabolic syndrome were found in the studied population based on the established criteria. However, it is important to note that the sample size could have been a significant factor influencing the results. Therefore, further studies with a larger sample size are necessary.