Body Mass Index and Blood Pressure Pattern through Menarcheal Age in an Italian Village

Aims: Recent investigations correlated early menarche to cardiovascular risk factors in adulthood, whereas others underlined relationship of menarcheal age to body mass index (BMI) and dysmetabolic conditions. Our aim was to assess whether early menarche could indicate an increased risk factor for enhanced blood pressure and/or hypertensive-range values (systolic/diastolic blood pressure beyond the 95th percentile) within the narrow window of the sexual maturation, 12y to 14y.
Methodology: 463 Caucasian Italian girls were studied at both 12y and 14y: body height (BH), weight (BW), BMI, systolic-diastolic blood pressure (SBP, DBP), presence-absence of menarche were recorded.
Results and Discussion: Lowest quartile for BH, BW, BMI in 12y girls was associated with lower probability (~-20%) of having menarche before 14y. Conversely, girls who developed menarche before 12y, at 12y showed higher average BH, BW, BMI, SBP/DBP values versus girls who developed menarche after 12y (about +3.2%;+16.2%;+8.8%;+5.5%;+9.2%, respectively). However, 14y girls of all groups showed similar average SBP and DBP and similar prevalence for hypertensive-range values. Interestingly, at 12y BMI was correlated to hypertensive values of both 12y and 14y (X2=17.5; X2=15.9; respectively; P<.001). Regression analysis showed that unitary increase of BMI at 12y yielded an increase of 1.04 mmHg for SBP and 0.55 mmHg for DBP in 14y girls.
Conclusions: Early menarcheal age (before 12y) was accompanied by higher SBP and DBP at 12y, but also by higher BH, BW and BMI, versus girls with menarche after 12y. However, early menarcheal age did not influence average SBP/DBP and prevalence of hypertensive-range values in 14y girls. BMI was strongly related to menarcheal status at both 12y and 14y, thus indicating that within this age (12y to 14y) BMI influenced both menarcheal triggering and blood pressure. Further investigations are needed to verify whether cardiovascular risk factors are influenced also in adult age by early menarche, or by high BMI at 12y-14y.