Cardiometabolic Health
obesity, cardiometabolic diseases, CVD, CRF, overweight or obesity, metabolic syndrome
OBESITY, CVD, CRF, ADIPOSITY, METABOLIC SYNDROME, HEART, TYPE 2 DIABETES
Our study has demonstrated a sizable reduction in cardiometabolic risk (approximately 0.38 SDs), and the within-individual change showed more participants at risk of metabolic syndrome at baseline were no longer at risk after exercise compared with controls. We reason that the risk reduction was mainly due to the improvements in blood lipid levels, total and visceral adiposity, and CRF, which were the cardiometabolic outcomes affected by the exercise program. In agreement with the American Heart Association,Our results are consistent with recent meta-analyses in children with overweight or obesity showing that concurrent aerobic and resistance training can improve blood lipid levels, mainly LDL cholesterol and triglycerides.Children in the exercise group improved their body composition by reducing their total and visceral fat mass. These results are in line with the previous literature studying children with obesity regarding the reductions in body mass index and fat mass.Regarding physical fitness, the exercise program improved CRF, both the performance in the test (laps) and the estimated V̇None of the previous studies have analyzed the effects of exercise programs on composite cardiometabolic risk scores, which hampers comparisons in this regard. We believe this is a strength of our study to quantify the effect on the composite cardiometabolic risk scores, which are valid measures of risk for type 2 diabetes, CVD, and other cardiometabolic diseases,