Role of neck circumference for diagnosis of central obesity in community subjects aged over 50 / 实用医学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To explore the role of neck circumference (NC) in identifying central obesity. Methods A community-based cross-sectional survey was conducted from October 2010 to January 2011 in Shipai community,Guangzhou. A total of 1494 subjects(72.8％)aged over 50 were investigated. Height,weight,waist circumference (WC) and NC were measured in all subjects. Central obesity was defined by the standard in the 2013 China Guideline(WC≥90.0 cm for men or WC≥85.0 cm for women). Results The median age of 1473 subjects with complete data was 61 years(55～68 years). NC was significantly positively correlated with WC and body mass index(correlation coefficient was 0.639 and 0.565,respectively,P<0.001). ROC curves showed that the area under the curve for the ability of neck circumference to determine visceral adiposity was 0.884(95％CI:0.855 ～ 0.909,P < 0.0001)for men and 0.849(95％CI:0.824 ～ 0.872,P < 0.0001)for women. Moreover,in men ,a NC of 38.5 cm had a sensitivity of 75.2％and specificity of 85.4％,and in women ,a NC of 33.4 cm had a sensitivity of 84.8％ and specificity of 69.4％,which were the optimal cutoffs for identifying central obesity. Conclusions NC could be used as an alternative for WC and body mass index to identify central obesity in Chi-nese subjects aged over 50 in community-based setting.