A Systematic Review on the Relationship of Dietary Habits and Blood Pressure in the Pediatric Age Group

Background Tracking of blood pressure from early life to adulthood and the increasing prevalence of elevated blood pressure in the pediatric age group are considered as important health issues. Rapid lifestyle change and dietary habits are considered as important determinants of this problem. This study aimed to systematically review the studies on the association of dietary habits and blood pressure in the pediatric age group.  Materials and Methods The search was conducted from November 2015 to August 2016 .Those papers were included that investigated the association of dietary habits on blood pressure in children and adolescents aged less than 18 years. The following medical subject headings and keywords were used to search all field (Diet OR nutrition OR nutrient OR food OR food habits OR food preferences) AND (Blood pressure OR hypertension OR high blood pressure OR systolic pressure OR diastolic pressure OR Systolic Blood Pressure [TIAB] OR Diastolic Blood Pressure [TIAB]) AND (child [Mesh] OR children [TIAB] OR adolescent [Mesh] [TIAB] OR pediatrics [Mesh] OR paediatric [TIAB]) Results A total of 549 studies were initially identified in the databases. After excluding duplicate studies, 270 articles were retrieved and we reviewed them based on their titles and abstracts; then 161 articles were selected for more detail review. Findings of multiple studies showed the beneficial effect of fruits, vegetables and dairy products on blood pressure in children. Conclusion Increasing evidences indicate that dietary habits, notably daily salt intake of children is directly related to their blood pressure level. Our findings serve as confirmatory evidence on the necessity of paying more attention to primordial and primary prevention of hypertension.