LONDON London: Scientists have developed a new blood test that uses lipids to identify children who are more vulnerable to obesity- problems, such as type 2 diabetes, liver and heart disease.Researchers at King's College London have discovered a new link between lipids and disorders that affect children's metabolism, and the finding could provide an early warning system for diseases including liver disease. The study was published in Nature Medicine.

The researchers propose that this could help medical professionals more quickly identify early disease indicators in children and facilitate their access to appropriate treatment using blood plasma testing machines already in use in hospitals. The findings also refute the common belief that cholesterol is a major cause of obesity- complications in children, identifying new lipid molecules that contribute to health risks such as blood pressure but are not solely to a child's weight.

Lipids are traditionally thought of as fatty acids in the body, the good or bad types of cholesterol or triglycerides, the fats found in the bloodstream that are the most common in the human body. Recent studies from the same group of scientists have suggested that the picture is more complex.

Using a chemistry- technique called mass spectrometry, current evidence shows there are thousands of types of lipids in the body, each with a different function. Using a control sample of 1,300 obese children, the team assessed their lipids in the blood. 200 of them were then put on the Holbeck-model for a year, a popular lifestyle intervention for people with obesity in Denmark.

Subsequent readings showed that among the intervention group, despite limited improvements in the BMI of some children, there was a reduction in the number of lipids associated with diabetes risk, insulin resistance and blood pressure. Dr. Christina Legido-Quigley, a group leader in systems medicine at King's College London, head of systems medicine at the Steno Diabetes Center Copenhagen (SDCC) and lead author, said: “For decades, scientists have relied on a classification system for lipids that divided them into good and bad cholesterol, but now with a simple blood test we can assess a much broader range of lipid molecules that can serve as important early warning signs for disease. In the future, this could be a completely new way to evaluate a person's individual risk of disease and by studying how lipid molecules are changed in the body we could even prevent metabolic diseases such as diabetes altogether.”