Waist-to-height ratio as a practical indicator for screening pediatric metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease in diverse populations and genetic backgrounds.

Abstract

Background: Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD) is the leading chronic liver disease in children and adolescents; this parallels the global obesity epidemic. The contribution of genetic susceptibility to pediatric MASLD, and its interaction with anthropometric and biochemical indices used for non-invasive screening remains poorly understood. We aimed to evaluate waist-to-height ratio (WHtR) as a simple, equitable, and scalable tool for early identification of pediatric MASLD and relate this to genetic risk.

Methods: We combined school-based data from 1010 Chinese children with analyses of the Global Burden of Disease, the 1000 Genomes Project, and the US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). Thirteen MASLD-related single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were genotyped to construct a genetic risk score (GRS). We examined global epidemiological patterns, quantified inter-population allele divergence, and assessed how GRS modifies cutoffs and performance of nine anthropometric and biochemical indices.

Results: Genetic analysis revealed minimal frequency divergence across most ancestries (mean Fixation index < 0.05), except for the African ancestry where there was moderate divergence. Higher GRS were associated with lower cutoffs across indices. When GRS Z-score increased from -3 to 3, visceral adiposity index showed the sharpest changes (Z-score decreased from 1.5 to -1.8), while BFP (1.2 to 0.1) and WHtR (1.5 to 0.1) showed gradual change. Furthermore, incorporating GRS into the base anthropometric models yielded only marginal improvements in overall screening performance [area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) and Youden Index]. Validation in NHANES showed WHtR ≥ 0.48 retained high discrimination (AUC > 0.87) across most genetic variants.

Conclusions: This study suggests that WHtR is a consistent and practical tool for screening pediatric patients with MASLD across diverse populations. While genetic variation may influence optimal thresholds, WHtR ≥ 0.48 appears broadly applicable, supporting its potential use as a frontline screening metric in diverse settings.