Glucose metabolism abnormalities among pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia survivors: Assessment and relation to body mass index and waist to hip ratio

Cardiometabolic Health After Pediatric Cancer Treatment: Adolescents Are More Affected than Children

This cross-sectional study aimed at comparing the cardiometabolic (CM) health of children and adolescents and identifying factors associated with CM complications shortly after cancer treatment. Cancer-related characteristics, blood pressure (BP), anthropometry, and biochemical parameters were collected in 80 patients (56.3% female, mean age: 11.8 years; range: 4.5 - 21.0) a mean of 1.4 years following therapy completion. Compared to children, adolescents had higher mean z-score of insulin (-0.47 vs. 0.20; P = 0.01), HOMA-IR (-0.40 vs. 0.25; P = 0.02), waist-to-height ratio (0.36 vs. 0.84; P = 0.01), subscapular skinfold thickness (-0.19 vs. 0.47; P = 0.02), total body fat (-1.43 vs. 0.26; P < 0.01), and lower mean z-score of HDL-C (0.07 vs. -0.53; P < 0.01). Adolescents were more likely to have high BP (42% vs. 15%; P < 0.01), dyslipidemia (64% vs. 15%; P < 0.001), and cumulating ≥ 2 CM complications (42% vs. 2%; P < 0.001) than children. Adiposity indices (z-scores) were associated with high BP [odds ratio (OR) ranging from 2.11 to 4.09] and dyslipidemia (OR ranging from 2.06 to 4.34). These results suggest that adolescents have a worse CM profile than children shortly after therapy and that adiposity parameters are associated with CM complications, highliting the importance to develop intervention strategies targeting this population.

Adiposity in Survivors of Cancer in Childhood: How is it Measured and Why Does it Matter?

Survival of cancer in childhood is increasingly common with modern therapeutic protocols but leads frequently to adverse long-term impacts on health, including metabolic and cardiovascular disease. Changes in body composition, especially an increase in fat mass and a decrease in muscle mass, are found early in patients with pediatric cancer, persist long after treatment has been completed and seem to contribute to the development of chronic disease. This review details the effects of such changes in body composition and reviews the underlying pathophysiology of the development of sarcopenic obesity and its adverse metabolic impact. The authors discuss the particular challenges in identifying obesity accurately in survivors of pediatric cancer using available measurement techniques, given that common measures, such as body mass index, do not distinguish between muscle and adipose tissue or assess their distribution. The authors highlight the importance of a harmonized approach to the assessment of body composition in pediatric cancer survivors and early identification of risk using "gold-standard" measurements. This will improve our understanding of the significance of adiposity and sarcopenia in this population, help identify thresholds predictive of metabolic risk, and ultimately prevent or ameliorate the long-term metabolic and cardiovascular impacts on health experienced by survivors of cancer in childhood.