Background Hypertension and visceral obesity are major cardiovascular risk factors. There are two parallel definitions of abdominal obesity — the ATP III defines abdominal obesity as a waist circumference more than 102 cm for men and 88 cm for women, whereas the IDF criteria are 94 cm for men and 80 cm for women. In new PTNT guidelines, the IDF criteria are recommended. The aim of our paper is to asses the influence of change in definition on abdominal obesity prevalence among hypertensive patients.
Material and methods We studied consecutive patients visiting general practitioners enrolled into the IDEA Study. Subjects underwent physical examination with waist circumference assessment. The prevalence of abdominal obesity among hypertensives was analyzed according to the ATP III and IDF criteria.
Results Fife thousand three hundred seventy one patients were included into the study (2024 men, 3347 women). According to the ATP criteria, visceral obesity was more prevalent in hypertensives than in normotensives (75.5% vs. 36.7% in women, and 54.0% vs. 23.1 in men; p < 0.001 for both comparisons). Similarly, hypertension was associated with higher prevalence of visceral obesity when IDF criteria were used (91.2% vs. 60.9% in women, and 80.2% vs. 51.1 in men; p < 0.001 for both comparisons). Application of IDF criteria increased abdominal obesity prevalence increase among hypertensives from 67.2% to 86.9%. Application of both ATP III and IDF criteria resulted in significant increase in prevalence of abdominal obesity among hypertensive women in all age groups, whereas for men it was true only for the ATP III criteria. The difference between abdominal obesity prevalence according to the ATP III and IDF criteria was significant in all age groups, especially among younger patients.
Conclusions Two thirds of Polish patients are either overweight or obese. Abdominal obesity, according to ATP III criteria is twice more prevalent among hypertensives than subjects with normal blood pressure. The application of IDF criteria increases abdominal obesity prevalence among Polish hypertensives from 67.2% to 86.9%.
Arterial Hypertension 2011, vol. 15, no 3, pages 155–162.