Obesity and visceral fat: Indicators for anemia among household women visiting a health camp on world obesity day

Abstract

BackgroundObesity and anemia are among most common non-communicable diseases not only in India but around the world. These conditions are observed together more among females. Obesity being a risk factor for various lifestyle disease, is hypothesized to affect iron absorption and hence level of hemoglobin. ObjectivesTo find the prevalence of obesity and anemia among given sample population and to find out various factors affecting obesity and anemia. MethodsA cross sectional study was done among married females visiting a health camp on World Obesity Day. They were assessed using a self-administered semi-structured questionnaire and anthropometric examination. Basic clinical examination, body fat analysis and blood indices were also done. ResultsThe mean age of study participants was found to be 30.27 ± 5.3 years. 487 (70.78%) of the study participants were found obese with BMI >23 kg/m2 and 61 (8.86%%) participants were found to be anemic. Increasing age, education level, menstrual flow, gravida, parity were found to be significantly associated with obesity. Among participants who were anemic, majority (86.9%) had low visceral fat, suggesting the relationship of anemia and fat metabolism is more related to peripheral fat deposition and not much to visceral fat (p < 0.05). ConclusionOur study findings suggest there is a need to carry out in-depth longitudinal and multicentric studies on larger population to see the exact relationship between visceral fat/obesity and anemia as in our study, the prevalence of anemia was very less and thus giving confusing results about visceral and total body fat relation with anaemia.