Over the past three decades, research into the metabolic syndrome, a
clustering of cardio-metabolic risk factors, has increasingly gained
pace as researchers and clinicians try and determine its clinical value
among adults. The interest in metabolic syndrome has filtered through to
the pediatric setting and, with it, has brought many of the same
difficulties that have been described for adults. A number of papers
from long-term observational studies have shown that children with
metabolic syndrome or a higher metabolic syndrome load are at increased
risk of developing type 2 diabetes and indicators for cardiovascular
disease in adulthood. In this chapter, we overview these data and delve
deeper into the potential clinical utility of assigning risk in
childhood based on the metabolic syndrome. Finally, we outline areas for
possible future enquiry.