RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN AN INDEX OF BODY-FAT DISTRIBUTION (BASED ON WAIST AND HIP CIRCUMFERENCES) AND STATURE, AND BIOCHEMICAL COMPLICATIONS IN OBESE CHILDREN

OBJECTIVE: To determine the clinical utility of a new age-adjusted mea sure of body fat distribution (based on waist and hip circumferences) and stature, in relation to biochemical complications in obese childre n. DESIGN: Cross-sectional, clinical study. The formula to calculate t he common standard deviation score (SDS) of waist-to-hip ratio/height (WHR/Ht) was obtained from the data of control children. The relations hip between WHR/Ht SDS, as the age-adjusted measure, in obese children and their clinical laboratory data was evaluated. SUBJECTS: Outpatien t obese Japanese children (102 boys and 75 girls) and control children (508 boys and 549 girls), ranging in age from 6-15 y. MEASUREMENTS: H eight, body weight, waist girth, hip girth, triceps and subscapular sk infold thicknesses, as anthropometric measures. Percent overweight, pe rcent body fat, waist girth, WHR and WHR/Ht SDS as criteria for obesit y. Clinical laboratory analyses for fasting blood samples of obese chi ldren. RESULTS: The WHR/Ht SDS closely correlated with age in obese ch ildren, thus reflecting the progress of abdominal obesity during growt h. The obese boys were more hyperlipidaemic than the girls were, altho ugh the percent overweight was similar in both genders. The percent ov erweight, percent body fat, waist girth and WHR/Ht SDS all correlated well with triglyceride (TG), alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and insuli n in boys, whereas only waist girth and WHR/Ht SDS showed a close corr elation with TG and insulin in girls. The obese subjects were subdivid ed according to the number of abnormal values observed in TG, ALT and insulin. For obese boys, all five indices of obesity were higher in th e groups with complications than in the group without. In the girls, o nly the WHR/Ht SDS constantly differed between subgroups. WHR/Ht SDS m ost obviously distinguished the groups with complications from the oth er group with a wide margin of difference (2-fold in boys and > 2 -fol d in girls) in the mean values. CONCLUSION: The WHR/Ht SDS can serve a s an index predicting the occurrence of biochemical complications in o bese children ranging from the age of 6-15 y.