The US research, which looked at 957 children from birth, was inspired by a rising trend of high blood pressure in American children and adolescents.
The experts found that large hikes in body mass index, a measure of height related to weight, from birth to six months, and aged two to three, can lead to higher blood pressure when children are around eight-years-old - which is linked to health problems in adulthood.
Every rising increment of BMI was associated with an increase of around 1 to 1.5 mmHg in systolic blood pressure - the pressure in the arteries when the heart beats.
‘Our findings suggest that more rapid gain in body mass index during the first six post-natal months and in the pre-school years may lead to higher systolic blood pressure in mid-childhood, regardless of size at birth,’ the researchers wrote in the US journal Hypertension.
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