Takeaway meal consumption and risk markers for coronary heart disease, type 2 diabetes and obesity in children aged 9-10 years: a cross-sectional study.

<bold>Objective: </bold>To investigate associations between takeaway meal consumption and risk markers for coronary heart disease, type 2 diabetes and obesity risk markers in children.<bold>Design: </bold>A cross-sectional, school-based observational study.<bold>Setting: </bold>85 primary schools across London, Birmingham and Leicester.<bold>Participants: </bold>1948 UK primary school children in year 5, aged 9-10 years.<bold>Main Outcome Measures: </bold>Children reported their frequency of takeaway meal consumption, completed a 24-hour dietary recall, had physical measurements and provided a fasting blood sample.<bold>Results: </bold>Among 1948 participants with complete data, 499 (26%) never/hardly ever consumed a takeaway meal, 894 (46%) did so <1/week and 555 (28%) did ≥1/week. In models adjusted for age, sex, month, school, ethnicity and socioeconomic status, more frequent takeaway meal consumption was associated with higher dietary intakes of energy, fat % energy and saturated fat % energy and higher energy density (all P trend <0.001) and lower starch, protein and micronutrient intakes (all P trend <0.05). A higher frequency of takeaway meal consumption was associated with higher serum total cholesterol and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol (P trend=0.04, 0.01, respectively); children eating a takeaway meal ≥1/week had total cholesterol and LDL cholesterol 0.09 mmol/L (95% CI 0.01 to 0.18) and 0.10 mmol/L (95% CI 0.02 to 0.18) higher respectively than children never/hardly ever eating a takeaway meal; their fat mass index was also higher.<bold>Conclusions: </bold>More frequent takeaway meal consumption in children was associated with unhealthy dietary nutrient intake patterns and potentially with adverse longer term consequences for obesity and coronary heart disease risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]