title: Body mass index or body fat! Which is a better obesity scale for Pakistani population?
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To compare two methods of classifying obesity based on body mass index and body fat percentage.
  
  
  METHODS
  The cross-sectional study was conducted from November 2012 to August 2013 at Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, Karachi. Male and female volunteers between the ages 15-65 years were selected using simple random sampling. They were classified into different groups for body mass index and body fat percentage measured through bioelectrical impedance scale. The subjects were sub-grouped into underweight, normal weight, overweight and obese. SPSS 11 was used for statistical analysis.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The mean age of the 828 healthy volunteers was 25.67±10.10 years. A total of 552 (66.6%) subjects had a higher body fat percentage and were misclassified by body mass index. Only 276 (33.3%) subjects had body fat percentage values corresponding to the body mass index classification. The difference in terms of categorising obesity was highly significant (p<0.001). Both body mass index and body fat percentage showed positive correlation with age (r=0.144; p=0.001) (r=0.261; p=0.001) and weight (r=0.578; p=0.001) (r=0.444; p=0.001) respectively. Moreover body fat percentage showed a significant positive association with gender (r=0.109; p=0.027) whereas BMI did not.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Body fat percentage should be incorporated for a better understanding as well as categorising of obesity.
authors.forename: Syeda Sadia
authors.initials: SS
authors.lastname: Fatima
authors.forename: Rehana
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Rehman
authors.forename: Bushra
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Chaudhry
mesh_terms: D050154:Adiposity / Q000208:ethnology*; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D044466:Asian People; D015992:Body Mass Index; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009765:Obesity / Q000145:classification* / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000208:ethnology*; D010154:Pakistan; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D055815:Young Adult