SUMMARY
Abdominal obesity epidemiology amongst adult women resident in Southern Brazil
The objective of this study was to investigate the risk factors associated with abdominal obesity in women. A cross-sectional population based study was carried out on 981 women aged 20 to 60 years living in Southern Brazil. Abdominal adiposity was assessed by waist circumference (WC) = 88 cm. Poisson regression models were used to obtain prevalence ratios (PR) and their confidence intervals. The abdominal obesity prevalence was 23,3% (IC_95%: 20,7-26,0). The main factors associated with the outcome were: having low education level, being unemployed, being more than 40 years old, having family obesity history, and being married. Adjusted analyses showed increased obesity prevalence in hypertensive women (Prevalence Ratio - PR=2,06; CI_95%: 1,58 – 2,69) and those having higher number of children (PR=1,17; CI_95% 1,00 – 1,37). Later menarche, at 12-13 years and at 14 years of age, protected against obesity comparing to women with earlier menarche at 8-11 years, respectively, 31% and 46% of protection. The understanding of how the abdominal obesity is distributed among the population allows effective planning and action implementation towards the reduction rates of this nutritional and public health problem.

Key words: Abdominal obesity, abdominal adiposity, women, risk factors, menarche, populational based-study.



Recibido: 30/07/2007
Aceptado: 04/11/2007

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