RESUMEN
BACKGROUND: Obesity is the most important modifiable risk factor in the pathogenesis of type-2 diabetes reported in most cross sectional studies. However, racial factors seem to be important in the relationship between body mass index (BMI) and glucose intolerance. This study aims at defining the relationship between these variables in two suburban populations in Nigeria. METHOD: A prospective survey of Adults aged 55 years or younger who gave informed consent, in two communities (Makarfi and Giwa) near Zaria, northern Nigeria was done. The BMI and casual blood sugar using capillary blood assessed with the Ames glucometer were determined for all the subjects. Students t-test was used to compare continuous variables while Pearson's correlation coefficient was used for continuous variables; the level of significance was p < 0.05 in each case. RESULT: Three-hundred and seventeen subjects participated in the study Mean age of subjects was 35.03 +/- 9.79 years (33.0 +/- 9.64 among females and 36.18 +/- 9.59 among males p = 0.1007). CONCLUSION: Female subjects had significantly higher BMI than their male counter parts, (26.61 +/- 7.19 KgM2 versus 24.01 +/- 5.39, KgM2 p = 0.0341.) Casual blood sugar levels were however similar between males and females 85.21 +/-27.04 mg/dl versus 85.88 +/- 14.74 mg/dl, p = 0.8868. There was a positive but non-significant correlation between casual blood sugar and BMI among female subjects (r = +0.1520, p > 0.05) in the males however, the correlation between these variables was not significant (r = -0.0395, p > 0.5).