ESPE Abstracts

Background: A subset of central obese but normal weight individuals has been identified, who harbor potentially increased risks for development of MS despite a normal BMI.

Objective and hypotheses: We try to evaluate metabolic syndrome (MS) components of normal weight central obese adolescents in Korea stratified by waist-to-height ratio (WHR).

Method: This is a cross-sectional study. Data were obtained from the Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey conducted during 2008–2010. The subjects were grouped as normal (5th–85th percentiles) or overweight (≥85th percentile) by BMI and central obesity was defined as those in the upper highest quartile of age and sex specific WHR. Body composition groups were classified into no central obesity normal weight (NW), central obesity normal weight (CONW), no central obesity overweight (OW), and central obesity overweight (COOW).

Results: The prevalence of NW was 72.7% (604/832), CONW was 9.6% (83/832), OW was 2.5% (20/832), and COOW was 15.1% (125/832) in females. The prevalence of NW was 72.3% (662/909), CONW was 7.0% (61/909), OW was 2.2% (21/909), and COOW was 18.5% (165/909) in males. In females, CONW showed higher levels of insulin (P<0.006), HOMA-IR (P<0.006), and ALT (P<0.001) than NW. In males, CONW had higher levels of insulin (P<0.0001), HOMA-IR (P<.0001), and WBC count (P<0.021) and lower level of HDL (P<.0001) than NW. However, there was no significant difference in MS components between CONW and OW in both females and males. WHR had significant positive correlations with BMI, insulin, HOMA-IR, and ALT in females. WHR also had significant positive correlations with BMI, insulin, HOMA-IR, TG/HDL ratio, and ALT, WBC and a negative correlation with HDL in males. In males, CONW showed 2.5 times (95% CI, 1.21–5.00) more likely to having high insulin resistance than NW after adjusting for age, weight, and ALT.

Conclusion: The use of WHR has discovered CONW. The CONW has higher insulin resistance than NW in male Korean adolescents.