BMI and body fat percent: affluent adolescent girls in Bangalore City.

OBJECTIVE The present study was conducted to assess the BMI and Body Fat percent among the affluent adolescent girls (n = 794) (9-18 years) and to determine the prevalence of overweight and obesity. METHOD All measurements were recorded for two and a half years, at six monthly intervals. The study design was crosslinked longitudinal in nature, thus increasing the sample size at the end of the study from 794 to an observational figure of 3970. BMI clubbed with BIA field technique to measure the adiposity (body fat %) were used to assess the overweight among them. RESULT According to CDC BMI criteria, the prevalence of overweight and obesity in affluent adolescent school girls was seen in 13.1% and 4.3% respectively. The actual body fat per cent values for assessing overweight and obesity among the girls was calculated based on cutoffs of 85th and 95th percentile values respectively. The body fat% 85th percentile values for assessing overweight among the girls ranged from 20.7 to 34.1 and 95th percentile values from 25.9 to 41.2 for ages 9 to 17.5 years respectively. Higher velocity of BMI and body fat per cent were also observed during the pubertal period, between 10 to 12 years among the girls. CONCLUSION Overweight is an emerging health problem in adolescent girls belonging to affluent families in Bangalore city.