Healthy excessive weight in Portuguese women 4 years after delivery of a liveborn

Abstract

ObjectiveTo quantify the prevalence of healthy excessive weight and determinants of metabolic profile, considering women's reproductive life. MethodsWe evaluated 1847 mothers of a birth cohort assembled after delivery and reevaluated 4years later. A healthy profile was defined as the absence of hypertension, diabetes, dyslipidemia, C-reactive protein <3mg/l and being below the second tertile of HOMA-IR. Adjusted odds ratios (OR) and confidence intervals (95% CI) were computed using multinomial logistic regression, taking women with normal BMI as the reference category of the outcome. ResultsFour years after delivery, 47% of women had normal BMI, 33% were overweight and 20% obese. In each BMI class, 61%, 33% and 12% presented a healthy metabolic profile, respectively. Family history of CVD/cardiometabolic risk factors was associated with a higher probability of obesity with a not healthy metabolic profile (OR=1.39 95% CI: 0.98–1.98). Women who breastfed the enrolled child for >26weeks and practiced physical exercise were less likely to be obese and metabolically unhealthy (OR=0.39 95% CI: 0.23–0.68; OR=0.48 95% CI: 0.33–0.70, respectively), with no effect on healthy excessive weight. ConclusionsThese results support the existence of a healthy excessive weight phenotype in women after motherhood, influenced by anthropometrics, genetic and lifestyles characteristics.