Body Composition and Obesity in Korean Adolescents and its Impact on Diabetes Mellitus

Park, Hye Won; Chung, Sochung

Abstract

The prevalence of childhood obesity and diabetes is increasing worldwide including Korea and the global epidemic of obesity is an important public health issue. Obesity is defined as a body mass index (BMI) for age and gender greater than the 95th percentile of a reference population. However, when assessing obesity, status of excessive fat should be considered, because BMI, the widely used obesity screening method, has limitations as a surrogate index for adiposity. To assess adiposity, applying body composition analysis could be helpful in differentiating fat mass (FM) from fat free mass (FFM). As the hallmark of adolescents is rapid somatic growth, sexual development with gender differentiation, and significant physical compositional changes, the importance of body composition analysis is much greater in this age group. The prevalence of childhood and adolescent diabetes is also increasing and in certain cases it is difficult to diagnose the type of diabetes they have. In this review diverse methods of assessing obesity will be introduced as in using body composition chart, plotting fat free mass index (FFMI) and fat mass index (FMI) from the FFM, and FM values derived from the result of body composition analysis. Also percent of body fat values derived from Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES) for Korean adolescents will be presented. Finally, the impact of obesity on diabetes manifestation in the era of acceleration, usefulness of body composition chart in differentiating diabetes type and detecting atypical cases including double diabetes, and early strategy of diabetes management will be discussed.