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To better understand the relationship between body-mass index (BMI) and development of hypertension during childhood and adolescence, researchers conducted a retrospective cohort study involving >100,000 patients aged 3 to 17 years in three U.S. health delivery systems.
Study patients had ≥3 routine primary-care visits in which blood pressure, height, and weight were measured. Patients who had hypertension at baseline or who became underweight during the study period were excluded. Hypertension was defined as systolic blood pressure (SBP) or diastolic blood pressure (DBP) ≥95th percentile at ≥3 consecutive visits.
During a median follow-up of 3.1 years, results were as follows:
Incidence of hypertension was 0.3%.
Increasing SBP and DBP percenti…