title: Weight, height and body mass index distributions in geographically and ethnically diverse samples of older persons. Ad Hoc Committee on the Statistics of Anthropometry and Aging.
abstract: We compared anthropometric data (height, weight and body mass index) from 19 geographically and ethnically varied samples of community-dwelling elderly people. Participants were stratified into three age groups, 60-69, 70-79 and 80 years or older. We present age-group-specific means and standard deviations for height, weight and body mass index (BMI, weight/height2) and the prevalence of underweight (BMI < 20) and overweight (BMI > or = 30). Across studies there are large differences in the prevalence of overweight and underweight, but in all studies mean height and BMI decreased with age. In general, mean BMI among 70-79-year-old women is greater than that for men of a similar age, and the Mediterranean samples are heavier for height than samples from Western Europe, Asia, Africa and the United States. The comparisons suggest that the sensitivity and specificity of a fixed cut-off for underweight and overweight are likely to differ by sex, age, and geographic location in samples of older persons.
authors.affiliation: National Institute of Public Health and Environmental Protection, RIVM/CCM, Bilthoven, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: L J
authors.initials: LJ
authors.lastname: Launer
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Harris
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000886:Anthropometry; D001827:Body Height; D015992:Body Mass Index; D001835:Body Weight; D003431:Cross-Cultural Comparison; D005006:Ethnicity / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012016:Reference Values