Background: C-reactive protein (CRP) is an independent risk factor for atherosclerotic coronary heart diseases (ACHD) in adults. To help prevent ACHD, it may be useful to understand risk factors during childhood.

Objective: To investigate serum CRP and its relation to other risk factors for ACHD and adipocytokines (adiponectin, IL-6 and TNF-) in Japanese children.

Methods: CRP, conventional risk factors for ACHD and adipocytokines were determined in 568 children (340 boys and 228 girls aged 7 to 10 yr). Serum concentrations of adipocytokines were measured by sandwich ELISA.

Results: Children with high CRP concentrations (highest tertile) had higher BMI SD scores (BMI SD), insulin, insulin resistance, uric acid and adipocytokines, and more atherogenic lipoprotein profiles than other children. However, after being corrected by BMI SD, only HDL-C, apoA-I, IL-6 and TNF- for boys and HDL-C, apoB, uric acid, IL-6 and TNF- for girls were significantly correlated with CRP. IL-6 was the strongest predictive variable for CRP and accounted for 26.2% and 27.7% of the variability in serum concentrations of CRP in boys and girls, respectively. Serum concentrations of IL-6 were partly dependent on BMI SD and TNF- in both boys and girls.

Conclusion: Although serum concentrations of CRP are partly regulated by adipocytokines and conventional risk factors for ACHD, high CRP levels were associated with atherogenic profiles of cardiovascular risk factors in children. Our findings suggest that it may be important to control body weight to prevent an increase in serum CRP in children.