Adiposity Measures as Indicators of Metabolic Risk Factors in Adolescents

Abstract

Aim: To examine the relation between adiposity assessment methods (percentage body fat (%BF), BMI, and waist circumference (WC)) and individual metabolic risk factors (f-insulin, HDL cholesterol, triglycerides) and a combined measure of metabolic risk. Methods: Crosssectional study of 300 males (BMI 20.8 ± 3.0 kg/m²) and females (BMI 21.3 ± 2.9 kg/m²) 17 years of age. F-insulin and components of the metabolic syndrome defined by the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) were used as metabolic risk indicators, with samples stratified into BMI, %BF, and WC groups, respectively. Diagnostic accuracy was expressed as the area under the ROC curve (AUC). Results: In males, diagnostic accuracy for HDL and f-insulin was poor to fair for BMI (AUC 0.70, p = 0.001; 0.60, p = 0.22), WC (0.68, p = 0.003; 0.63, p = 0.11), and %BF (0.65, p = 0.009; 0.66, p = 0.04). The diagnostic accuracy for triglycerides was greater for all three measures (BMI 0.92, WC 0.95, %BF 0.87; all p < 0.001). For females, neither test performed better than chance for f-insulin and HDL, and only %BF performed better than chance for triglycerides (0.65, p = 0.08). All three measures exhibited higher accuracy for presence of ≥2 metabolic risk factors (AUCs 0.76–0.91, p < 0.001) in both sexes. Conclusion: %BF was not superior to BMI and WC for detecting metabolic risk in the general adolescent population.