Associations of obesity measures with metabolic risk factors in a community-based population in Japan.
BACKGROUND
The association of obesity measures (ie, body mass index (BMI), waist circumference (WC) and waist-to hip ratio (WHR)) with metabolic risk factors in community-based populations has not been well studied.


RESULTS
In the present study 759 men and 1,255 women aged between 30 and 79 years, without histories of stroke or coronary heart diseases, were dichotomized at the medians of BMI-WHR, WC-WHR and BMI-WC. The accumulation of 4 metabolic risk factors (risk _ sum) were examined: high blood pressure (> or =130/85 mmHg or on antihypertensive therapy); high triglycerides (> or =170 mg/dl); low high-density lipoprotein-cholesterol (<40 mg/dl); and impaired glucose tolerance (hemoglobin A1c > or =5.6% or on antidiabetic therapy). BMI and WC correlated well in both men (r=0.871) and women (r=0.874). All 3 obesity measures related with the metabolic risk factors. The area under the receiver-operating characteristic curve for BMI, WC and WHR to predict the risk _ sum > or =2 for men was 0.683, 0.709, and 0.700, respectively, and 0.715, 0.739, and 0.746, respectively, for women.


CONCLUSIONS
BMI may be used instead of WC if the latter is not available. When WC is measured, hip circumference also should be measured because the WHR may be the most valuable measure of obesity.
Nakamura
Yasuyuki
Y
Cardiovascular Epidemiology, Kyoto Women's University, Kyoto, Japan. nakamury@kyoto-wu.ac.jp
Turin
Tanvir C
TC
Kita
Yoshikuni
Y
Tamaki
Shinji
S
Tsujita
Yasuyuki
Y
Kadowaki
Takashi
T
Murakami
Yoshitaka
Y
Okamura
Tomonori
T
Ueshima
Hirotsugu
H
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D044466:Asian People; D015992:Body Mass Index; D008076:Cholesterol, HDL / Q000097:blood*; D005260:Female; D018149:Glucose Intolerance / Q000150:complications*; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000150:complications*; D015228:Hypertriglyceridemia / Q000150:complications*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009765:Obesity / Q000208:ethnology / Q000209:etiology* / Q000503:physiopathology; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D012372:ROC Curve; D012307:Risk Factors; D049629:Waist-Hip Ratio
D008076:Cholesterol, HDL