Sudha Chaudhari, Madhumati Otiv, Bharati Khairnar, Anand Pandit, Mahendra Hoge

are low birth weight [1] and a large percentage of them are small for gestational age (SGA). Infants with intrauterine growth restriction have been reported to have a seven-fold increased risk of growth failure [2,3] and subsequently adult short stature. In addition, they are prone to a number of disorders like type II diabetes, central obesity, hypertension and coronary heart disease in adulthood, collectively called the “metabolic syndrome”[4,5]. Although there are many recent reports on the growth of very low birth weight (VLBW) [6] and extremely low birth weight (ELBW) infants [7], less attention has been paid to the long term growth of moderately low birth weight (LBW) children. We have previously reported on the physical growth of LBW children at 12 years [8]. This study describes the growth at early adulthood of “nondisabled” LBW children who were born in the late eighties with birth weight less than 2000 grams. We have also tried to find out if there were any early predictors of metabolic syndrome, such as central obesity or hypertension. To the best of our knowledge, this is the only Indian study, where low birth weight children have been followed up till adulthood. METHODS