ArticleBiology2021
Assessment of Anthropometric Indices for Optimal Cut-Offs for Obesity Screening in a South African Adolescent Population.
Article in Biology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Waist-to-Height Ratio as a predictor of cardiovascular and metabolic health in a pediatric population.PloS one · 2025Trial
- The validity of mid-upper arm circumference as an indicator of underweight, overweight and obesity adults in Bangladesh.PloS one · 2025Article
- Assessment of the Performance of Obesity Measures in the Screening of Hypertension in a South African Adolescent Population.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
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9 authors.
Funding
Abstract
The assessment of obesity in sub-Saharan Africa relies on cut-offs established from western populations. This study assessed anthropometric indices to determine optimal cut-off values for obesity screening in the South African adolescent population. A cross-sectional study involving 1144 (796 females and 348 males) adolescents aged 11-17 years from the Eastern Cape Province of South African was conducted. Anthropometric parameters were measured. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis was performed to assess the sensitivity and specificity of obesity screening tools and establish cut-offs. The optimal cut-offs for obesity in the cohort using waist-to-height ratio (WHtR) as reference were: neck circumference (NC) = 30.6 cm, mid-upper arm circumference (MUAC) = 25.9 cm, waist circumference (WC) = 75.1 cm, hip circumference (HC) = 92.15 cm and body mass index percentile (pBMI) = p85.2th. The new pBMI cut-off value at p85.2th improved the sensitivity of the test by approximately 30% compared to the CDC recommended BMI percentile (pBMIr) of p95.0th. When pBMI was used as reference, the optimal cut-offs in the cohort were: WHtR = 0.481, NC = 30.95 cm, MUAC = 27.95 cm, WC = 76.1 cm and HC = 95.75 cm. The WHtR optimal cut-off of 0.481 was close to the recommended cut-off value of 0.5. The predicted prevalence of obesity obtained using cut-offs from ROC analysis was higher than those from recommended references. All cut-off values for the various anthropometric measures generally increased with age for all percentile ranges. This study reveals a lower pBMI cut-off value, different from the CDC recommended cut-off, for screening obesity in a South African adolescent population. The study has established that the optimal pBMI cut-off for obesity screening may be ethnic-specific.
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