Higgins V, Omidi A, Tahmasebi H, et al. - As the prevalence of pediatric obesity is growing worldwide and strongly correlates with metabolic abnormalities, including inflammation, insulin resistance, and dyslipidemia, researchers evaluated the effect of 3 adiposity measures on levels of routinely assessed biochemical markers in apparently healthy children and adolescents. In the Canadian Laboratory Initiative on Pediatric Reference Intervals (CALIPER) cohort of healthy children and adolescents, the effect of adiposity on 35 biochemical markers was investigated by comparing serum biomarker levels between individuals with a normal weight, excess weight and obese BMI. The cohort consisted of 1,332 participants aged between 5.1 and 19.0 years with a BMI ranging from 13.4 to 65.0 kg/m². Excess adiposity greatly affects circulating levels of regularly tested laboratory markers in children and adolescents, most notably liver enzymes, lipids/lipoproteins, inflammatory markers and uric acid. Although it is unclear if altered biochemical marker levels represent health or indolent disease in subjects with overweight/obesity, clinicians should be aware of the impact of weight status on several laboratory tests.