title: The relationship of body mass index, medical costs, and job absenteeism.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To assess the relationship between body mass index, as categorized by the recently released guidelines of the NHLBI, and health care costs and absenteeism in a sample of municipal workers.
  
  
  METHODS
  A cross-sectional study was employed that compared the obesity-related health care costs and absences of normal and overweight/obese city workers.
  
  
  RESULTS
  While accounting for age, gender, race, smoking behavior, and educational attainment, BMI predicted both average annual health-care costs and work absence hours.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The NHLBI guidelines for overweight and obesity effectively predicted absences and health care costs.
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Promotion, University of Nevada-Las Vegas, Las Vegas, NV 89154-3050, USA. Tim.Bungum@ccmail.nevada.edu
authors.forename: Timothy
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Bungum
authors.forename: Monica
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Satterwhite
authors.forename: Allen W
authors.initials: AW
authors.lastname: Jackson
authors.forename: James R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Morrow
mesh_terms: D000041:Absenteeism; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D015992:Body Mass Index; D017281:Cost of Illness; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D017048:Health Care Costs; D006801:Humans; D009111:Local Government; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008913:Minority Groups; D009316:National Institutes of Health (U.S.); D009765:Obesity / Q000191:economics* / Q000208:ethnology; D012737:Sex Factors; D012907:Smoking; D015206:Southwestern United States; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014481:United States