Original article
Anthropometric Correlates of Total Body Fat, Abdominal Adiposity, and Cardiovascular Disease Risk Factors in a Biracial Sample of Men and Women

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mayocp.2011.12.017Get rights and content

Abstract

Objective

To investigate associations between anthropometric measurements and total body fat, abdominal adipose tissue, and cardiovascular disease risk factors in a large biracial sample.

Patients and Methods

This study is limited to cross-sectional analyses of data from participants attending a baseline visit between January 26, 1996, and February 1, 2011. The sample included 2037 individuals aged 18 to 69 years: 488 African American women (24%), 686 white women (34%), 196 African American men (9%), and 667 white men (33%). Anthropometry included weight; hip circumference; waist circumference; waist-hip, waist-height, and weight-height ratios; body adiposity index; and body mass index. Body fat and percentage of fat were measured by dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry, and abdominal visceral and subcutaneous adipose tissue were measured by computed tomography. Bivariate correlations, logistic regression models, and receiver operator characteristic curves were used, and analyses were stratified by sex and race.

Results

In each sex-by-race group, all anthropometric measures were highly correlated with percentage of fat, fat mass, and subcutaneous adipose tissue and moderately correlated with visceral adipose tissue, with the exception of the waist-hip ratio. The odds of having an elevated cardiometabolic risk were increased more than 2-fold per SD increase for most anthropometric variables, and the areas under the curve for each anthropometric measure were significantly greater than 0.5.

Conclusion

Several common anthropometric measures were moderately to highly correlated with total body fat, abdominal fat, and cardiovascular disease risk factors in a biracial sample of women and men. This comprehensive analysis provides evidence of the linkage between simple anthropometric measurements and the purported pathways between adiposity and health.

Section snippets

Study Population

The Pennington Center Longitudinal Study (PCLS) is an ongoing investigation of the associations among obesity, lifestyle factors, and the development of chronic diseases, such as type 2 diabetes mellitus and CVD.11 This study is limited to cross-sectional analyses of data from participants attending a baseline visit between January 26, 1996, and February 1, 2011. The sample consists of 2037 volunteers (488 African American women [24%], 686 white women [34%], 196 African American men [9%], and

Results

Sample characteristics are reported in Table 1. The prevalence of elevated risk factors ranged from 7.4% (36 of 488) for high triglyceride level in African American women to 36.6% (244 of 667) for high glucose level in white men. The percentage of participants who had 2 or more cardiometabolic risk factors ranged from 26.0% (51 of 196) in African American men to 37.5% (250 of 667) in white men.

In each sex-by-race group, all anthropometric measures were highly correlated with percentage of fat

Discussion

The present study simultaneously compared the ability of several popular anthropometric measurements to predict total body fat, CT-measured abdominal fat, and CVD risk factors in a large biracial sample of men and women. Each anthropometric measure exhibited moderate to high correlations with adiposity and CVD risk factors, and all variables were significant predictors of elevated cardiometabolic risk. Prior studies have suggested the use of one anthropometric measure over another. For example,

Conclusion

In this study, several common anthropometric measures were moderately to highly and equally correlated with total body fat, CT-measured abdominal fat, and CVD risk factors in a sample of African American and white women and men. This comprehensive analysis provides evidence of the linkage between simple anthropometric measurements and the purported pathways between adiposity and health.

Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge the contributions of Emily F. Mire, MS, and Connie D. Murla, BS, for data management and the many clinical scientists and staff of the Pennington Biomedical Research Center who have contributed data to the PCLS, particularly Donna H. Ryan, MD, Eric Ravussin, PhD, Frank L. Greenway, MD, Corby K. Martin, PhD, and George A. Bray, MD. We also acknowledge Jennifer Rood for her supervision of the chemistry analysis and Julia W. St Amant, RT (R), for her expert supervision of

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Grant Support: This research was supported by the Pennington Biomedical Research Center. Dr Heymsfield is funded, in part, by the George A. Bray, Jr. Endowed Super Chair in Nutrition; Dr Bouchard is funded, in part, by the John W. Barton, Sr. Chair in Genetics and Nutrition; and Dr Katzmarzyk is supported, in part, by the Louisiana Public Facilities Authority Endowed Chair in Nutrition. The PCLS is registered at ClinicalTrials.gov (identifier NCT00959270).

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