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Public health
Research
BMI trajectories and risk factors among 2-11-year-old children by their immigrant status: evidence from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children
  1. Tehzeeb Zulfiqar1,
  2. Richard A Burns2,
  3. Catherine D’Este3,
  4. Lyndall Strazdins4
  1. 1 National Centre for Epidemiology & Population Health, Research School of Population Health - ANU, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
  2. 2 Centre for Research on Ageing, Health & Wellbeing, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
  3. 3 National Centre for Epidemiology & Population Health, College of Health and Medicine, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
  4. 4 National Centre for Epidemiology & Population Health, Research School of Population Health, College of Health and Medicine, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
  1. Correspondence to Dr Tehzeeb Zulfiqar; tehzeeb.zulfiqar{at}anu.edu.au

Abstract

Objective This study aimed to identify body mass index (BMI) trajectories and their predictors in Australian children by their maternal immigrant status.

Methods Data on 4142 children aged 2–3 years were drawn from the birth cohort of the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children. BMI was calculated according to the International Obesity Task Force cut-off points. Immigrant status was determined by the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the United Nations Development Programme, Human Development Index criteria. Latent class growth analysis estimated distinct BMI trajectories, and multinomial logistic regression analysis examined factors associated with these BMI trajectories.

Results Two BMI groups and six BMI trajectories were identified. The stable trajectories group included high-risk (10%, n=375), moderate-risk (5%, n=215) and low-risk (68%, n=2861) BMI trajectories. The changing trajectories group included delayed-risk (6%, n=234), gradual-risk (8%, n=314) and declining-risk (3%, n=143) BMI trajectories. We found some evidence that children of immigrants from low-and middle-income countries were more likely to have moderate-risk and high-risk BMI trajectories compared with low-risk BMI trajectory. However, these associations were insignificant in fully adjusted models. The explanatory risk factors for moderate-risk and high-risk BMI trajectory were birth weight, family socioeconomic position, and organised sports participation. Our results also suggest that 4–7 years of age may be important for the prevention of overweight/obesity in children.

Discussion A better understanding of the risk factors associated with distinct BMI trajectories in immigrant children will inform effective preventive strategies. Some of these risk factors such as non-participation in organised sports, and high screen time, may also impede the integration of immigrant children into the host culture. Obesity prevention strategies aimed at increasing physical activities in immigrant children could help deliver a social and health benefit by increasing social integration among children of immigrants and Australians.

  • Emigrants and Immigrants
  • BMI trajectories
  • overweight
  • paediatric obesity

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2018-026845

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors TZ developed the original idea and planned the study. RAB and TZ conducted the data analysis. CDE contributed to the analysis. TZ led the writing. RAB, CDE and LS contributed to writing and interpretation of the results. LS, CDE and RAB reviewed and approved the final manuscript.

    • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Ethics approval The LSAC was approved by the Australian Institute of Family Studies Ethics Committee. The current analysis was approved by the Australian National University Human Research Ethics Committee (Protocol No 2015/421).

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Data sharing statement The data that support the findings of this study are available from the Australian Institute of Family Studies, but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under licence for the current study and so are not publicly available. Data are however available from the authors upon reasonable request and with permission of the Australian Institute of Family Studies.

    • Patient consent for publication Not required.