ArticlePloS one2018
Relation of body mass index to risk of developing inflammatory bowel disease amongst women in the Danish National Birth Cohort.
Article in PloS one, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers.
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 31 citations in OpenAlex.
- Early-Life Body Mass Index and Inflammatory Bowel Disease Risk: A Scandinavian Birth Cohort Study.Inflammatory bowel diseases · 2025Article
- Obesity-Mediated Inflammation and Its Influence on Inflammatory Bowel Disease: Pathophysiology, Clinical Impact, and Therapeutic Implications.Biomolecules · 2025Review
- Environmental risk factors of inflammatory bowel disease: toward a strategy of preventative health.Journal of Crohn's & colitis · 2025Review
- Development and validation of a predictive model for endoscopic improvement of Crohn's disease.World journal of gastrointestinal endoscopy · 2025Article
- Elevated fecal calprotectin is associated with gut microbial dysbiosis, altered serum markers and clinical outcomes in older individuals.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Positive faecal immunochemical test predicts the onset of inflammatory bowel disease: A nationwide, propensity score-matched study.Frontiers in immunology · 2023Article
- Adults with Crohn's disease exhibit elevated gynoid fat and reduced android fat irrespective of disease relapse or remission.Scientific reports · 2021Observational
- Bariatric Surgery and Risk of New-onset Inflammatory Bowel Disease: A Nationwide Cohort Study.Journal of Crohn's & colitis · 2021Observational
- Microbiome First Medicine in Health and Safety.Biomedicines · 2021Review
- Impact of Body Mass Index on the Development of Inflammatory Bowel Disease: A Systematic Review and Dose-Response Analysis of 15.6 Million Participants.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2021Review
- Trends and risk factors of elderly-onset Crohn's disease: A nationwide cohort study.World journal of gastroenterology · 2020Article
- Role of Obesity, Mesenteric Adipose Tissue, and Adipokines in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases.Biomolecules · 2019Review
- Obesity and Weight Gain Since Early Adulthood Are Associated With a Lower Risk of Microscopic Colitis.Clinical gastroenterology and hepatology : the official clinical practice journal of the American Gastroenterological Association · 2019Article
- Body mass index in young men and risk of inflammatory bowel disease through adult life: A population-based Danish cohort study.Scientific reports · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundCrohn's disease (CD) has traditionally been associated with weight loss and low BMI, yet paradoxically obesity has recently been suggested as a risk factor for CD, but not for ulcerative colitis (UC). We therefore hypothesized that the relation between BMI and CD is U shaped.
aimTo conduct a large population-based prospective cohort study of BMI and later risk of IBD, taking age at IBD diagnosis into account.
methodsA cohort of 74,512 women from the Danish National Birth Cohort, with BMI measured pre-pregnancy and 18 months after delivery, was followed for 1,022,250 person-years for development of IBD, according to the Danish National Patient Register. Associations were tested by Cox regression.
resultsOverweight subjects (25≤BMI<30 kg/m2) had the lowest risk of CD, whereas obesity (BMI≥30kg/m2) increased the risk of CD at all ages, and low BMI (BMI<18.5kg/m2) associated with CD diagnosed at age 18-<40 years. Hence, using normal weight subjects as the reference, adjusted HRs for risk of developing CD (at age 18-<40 years) were 1.8(95%CI, 0.9-3.7) for underweight, 0.6(0.3-1.2) for overweight, and 1.5(0.8-2.7) for obese individuals (pre-pregnancy BMI). HRs were greater for BMI determined 18 months after delivery. Splines for CD risk according to waist:height ratio confirmed a U-shaped relationship with CD occurring <40 years, and a linear relationship with CD diagnosed at age 40+. There was no relationship between BMI and risk of UC.
conclusionFor the first time, we demonstrate that both high BMI and low BMI are risk factors for CD. Underweight may be a pre-clinical manifestation of disease being present many years before onset with obesity being a true risk factor. This raises the question as to whether there may be two distinct forms of CD.
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