Correlates and predictors of serum total cholesterol in adolescents aged 12-17 years: the National Health Examination Survey.

To examine correlates and childhood predictors of serum total cholesterol in adolescence, measures of growth, development, and obesity were related to serum total cholesterol levels of youths aged 12-17 years in the National Health Examination Survey. In this sample, drawn from the U.S. population, serum total cholesterol levels were negatively correlated with indicators of growth and maturation in males aged 12-14 years and positively correlated with overweight or obesity at all ages. All measured variables could account for less than 15 percent of cholesterol variation in males and less than 6 percent in females. In white males, indicators of levels of maturation, growth, and changes in body fatness measured 28-53 months earlier were significant predictors of serum total cholesterol in adolescence, explaining 13 percent of its variation. Despite significant associations, indicators of growth, sexual maturation, and obesity explained only a small fraction of serum cholesterol variation in adolescents.