Comparison and agreement of criteria for the BMI classification of physically active elderly women living in the Backlands, semi-arid Region

Abstract

Introduction: The study of the nutritional status of the elderly deserves attention, since there is no consensus on the criteria for the evaluation of the Body Mass Index (BMI) of this population.Objective: To evaluate the nutritional status of elderly women practicing regular physical exercises, as well as to compare the World Health Organization (WHO) and Lipschitz criteria to the identification of health risk and to examine their agreement.Methods: Descriptive cross-sectional study with 76 elderly women in physical exercise groups in Petrolina-PE. The nutritional status was obtained by the calculation of BMI according to WHO and Lipschitz criteria. The analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used to compare the variables, followed by Tukey post hoc. The Kappa statistic established the agreement between the BMI criteria, the Spearman coefficient determined the correlation between BMI and abdominal circumference (AC).Results: Elderly patients aged 60-79 years were classified as being overweight by WHO and eutrophic by Lipschitz. Octogenarian demonstrated eutrophy, according to the criterion of Lipschitz, WHO diverged for this group between thinness and eutrophy. There was a weak agreement between both criteria, Kappa (0.232, p = 0.002) and a strong correlation between BMI and CA (r = 0.722, p <0.001).Conclusion: There was a divergence between the WHO and Lipschitz criteria. The WHO proved to be more sensitive to identifying overweight and obesity and Lipschitz's normal weight and malnutrition. The CA measure was more competent to detect health risk, especially in elderly eutrophic women.