A new research suggests that BMI is inversely linked to mortality

05 January, 2013

As against the prevalent opinion, people who are overweight according to the Body Mass Index (BMI) are can live longer when compared to the patients who have a normal weight. This research gives a new way to use BMI, as it can be used as a predictor for mortality risk.

RESEARCH CARRIED out by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finds a link between Body Mass Index and mortality from EMBASE databases (its an online information source for biomedical questions). About 100 studies were conducted on more than three million adults, who were all adjusted for age, sex and smoking habits.

And it was concluded that patients who had an overweight range of BMI 25-30 kg/m2 have six percent lower risk of death when compared with normal weight patients with a BMI 18.5-25 kg/m2. But a total contrast to it is, a patient classified as obese with a BMI of less than or equal to 30 kg/m2 has an 18 percent increased risk of death when compared with normal weight patients.

However, the patients who comes under the category of 'grade 1' obese patients with a BMI below 35 kg/m2 have no significant relation between Body Mass Index and mortality. While the grade 2 and 3 category patients with a BMI of 35 kg/m2 and more have 29 percent increased risk of death. This concludes that mortality risk among obese patients is largely contributed to the effect of the highest Body Mass Index's.

Katherine Flegal (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Hyattsville, Maryland, US) and colleagues, says that the study associates the mortality in adults with current standard BMI categories used in the United States and internationally. The findings also provide an information about the 'obesity paradox'. But BMI cannot be taken as a sole health risk phenotype, because their are many differences which are associated with the nutritional status, disability, disease, and mortality risk, reported The Times of India.