Economic costs of abdominal obesity.
BACKGROUND
To examine the relationship between waist circumference and future health care costs across a broad range of waist circumference values based on individual level data.


METHODS
A prospective cohort of 31,840 subjects aged 50-64 years at baseline had health status, lifestyle and socio-economic aspects assessed at entry. Individual data on health care consumption and associated costs were extracted from registers for the subsequent 7 years. Participants were stratified by presence of chronic disease at entry.


RESULTS
Increased waist circumference at baseline was associated with higher future health care costs. For increased and substantially increased waist circumference health care costs rise at a rate of 1.25% in women and 2.08% in men, per added centimetre above normal waistline. Thus, as an example, a woman with a waistline of 95 cm and without co-morbidities can be expected to incur an added future cost of approximately USD 397.- per annum compared to a woman in the normal waist circumference group, corresponding to 22% higher health care costs.


CONCLUSIONS
Future health care costs are higher for persons who have an increased waist circumference, which suggests that there may be a potential for significant resource savings through prevention of abdominal obesity.
Højgaard
Betina
B
Danish Institute for Health Services Research, Copenhagen University Hospital, Centre for Health and Society, Copenhagen, Denmark. beh@dsi.dk
Olsen
Kim Rose
KR
Søgaard
Jes
J
Sørensen
Thorkild I A
TI
Gyrd-Hansen
Dorte
D
D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000150:complications / Q000453:epidemiology; D015331:Cohort Studies; D003718:Denmark / Q000453:epidemiology; D048909:Diabetes Complications / Q000453:epidemiology; D003920:Diabetes Mellitus / Q000453:epidemiology; D005260:Female; D017048:Health Care Costs / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000150:complications / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D056128:Obesity, Abdominal / Q000150:complications / Q000191:economics* / Q000453:epidemiology; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012737:Sex Factors; D055105:Waist Circumference