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Posted on Jul 18, 2018, 12 a.m.
Researchers from York University Faculty of Health have released a study challenging the way we think about obesity and health, finding that patients with metabolic “healthy” obesity and no other metabolic risk factors do not have an increased rate of mortality, as published in Clinical Obesity.
This study is in contrast with the majority of literature and what is thought as majority of studies have defined metabolic “healthy” obesity as having up to one metabolic risk factor, which is problematic as hypertension alone increases mortality risk and past literature would have classed these patients with obesity and hypertension as “healthy”; which is likely why some studies have reported that “healthy” obesity as related with higher mortality risk. Unlike hypertension, diabetes, or dyslipidemia alone that are linked to higher mortality risks, obesity alone is not linked to higher mortality risk, according to the researchers.
This conduct this study the team included 5 cohort studies which involved 54,089 men and women who were categorized as having: obesity alone; obesity clustered with a metabolic factor, elevated glucose, blood pressure, or lipids alone; or clustered with obesity or another metabolic factor. Researchers analyzed data looking at how many people within each group had died and compared to those within normal weight populations with no metabolic risk factors.
According to the researchers 1 out of 20 individuals with obesity were found to have had no other metabolic abnormalities. Weight guidelines currently suggest that individuals with a body mass index over 30 kg/m2 should lose weight, which means if you have obesity even without other risk factors you are unhealthy.
According to the researchers evidence has been provided suggesting that individuals with metabolically “healthy” obesity are not at an elevated mortality rate, adding that they found that individuals of normal weight with no other metabolic risk factors were just as likely to die as an individual with obesity and no other risk factors. Meaning that hundreds of thousands of individuals in North America alone with metabolically “healthy” obesity and no other risk factors will be told to lose weight, when it may be questionable how much benefit they will actually receive, within reason, says Jennifer Kuk who lead the team at York University.
Materials provided by York University.
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Journal Reference:
J.L. Kuk, M. Rotondi, X. Sui, S. N. Blair, C. I. Ardern. Individuals with obesity but no other metabolic risk factors are not at significantly elevated all-cause mortality risk in men and women. Clinical Obesity, 2018; DOI: 10.1111/cob.12263
