Oct 08, 2015 05:35 AM EDT By Rashmi Kalia, UniversityHerald Reporter

A new diagnostic test developed by a University of Virginia Children's Hospital pediatrician and his collaborators will predict the risk for cardiovascular disease for adolescents, the Market business reports.

A team led by Dr. Mark DeBoer of the U.Va. Department of Pediatrics and Matthew Gurka of West Virginia University's School of Public Health developed the new diagnostic test.

Physicians may soon adapt the test to assess the future risk of a cardiovascular disease for teenagers.
The test evaluates a number of conditions, including increased blood pressure, high levels of blood sugar, body fat around the abdomen and waist, and high cholesterol.

The test also takes into account variables that are specific both to race and gender.

"The way that we normally diagnose metabolic syndrome appears to have some racial discrepancies, where African-American individuals are not diagnosed with metabolic syndrome at a very high rate and yet they are at very high risk for developing type 2 diabetes and [cardiovascular disease], so Dr. Gurka and I formulated a metabolic syndrome severity score that is specific to sex and ethnicity," DeBoer said.

In creating the diagnostic test, DeBoer and Gurka assessed children from the 1970s to as recently as 2014, at an average age of 49.6 years. They assessed their body mass index, systolic blood pressure, fasting triglycerides, HDL cholesterol (the so-called "good" cholesterol) and fasting glucose.

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