Foundations for Health Promotion with Youth: A Review of Observations from the Bogalusa Heart Study

Abstract

Cardiovascular risk factors associated with underlying coronary artery and hypertensive disease develop during childhood. Although the major adult heart diseases do not become symptomatic until adulthood, cardiovascular risk factors predictive of these diseases can be identified early in life. Race- and gender-specific observations from childhood to young adulthood provide clues to the early onset of cardiovascular disease risk. Observations on the distributions of levels, tracking, and determinants of blood pressure and serum lipids and lipoproteins and the impact of obesity on cardiovascular risk are of particular importance in understanding the clinical presentation of cardiovascular diseases later in life. Genetic and environmental factors obviously determine the development of the major cardiovascular diseases; however, there is a growing awareness that certain factors, for example, improper diet, physical inactivity, alcohol consumption and cigarette smoking, that lead to heart disease are behavioral in nature and environmentally related. The following data from the Bogalusa Heart Study, in part a review of previously published findings, provide the rationale for primary prevention of adult cardiovascular diseases beginning early in life.