Relationship of Metabolic Syndrome and Truncal Obesity Measured by Dual Energy X-ray Absorptiometry and Computed Tomography in Obese Women

Yoo, Sunmi; Kim, Ji Soo; Lee, Seon Yeong; Kim, Kyu Nam

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to evaluate and compare the validity of the truncal fat amount and visceral fat area measured by whole body dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DEXA) and by abdominal computed tomography, respectively, for the diagnosis of metabolic syndrome among overweight and obese Korean women.
METHODS
Subjects included 73 premenopausal adult women (age 20-52 yrs, body mass index 23.6-44.4 kg/m2) who visited an obesity clinic at a university affiliated hospital. Area under the curves (AUCs) from receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis were compared in detecting metabolic syndrome by body mass index (BMI) and waist circumference; visceral fat area and visceral/subcutaneous fat area by CT; total fat amount, regional fat amount for arms, legs and trunk, and regional %fat by DEXA.
RESULTS
Fifteen women (20.5%) had metabolic syndrome. Subjects diagnosed with metabolic syndrome manifested greater BMI, waist circumference, total fat amount and regional fat amount of arms and trunk according to DEXA, and a greater visceral fat area measured by CT compared to subjects without metabolic syndrome (all P < 0.001). AUC from ROC analysis for truncal fat amount (0.790) was the largest, followed by visceral fat area by CT (0.783), total fat amount by DEXA (0.774), BMI (0.771), regional fat amount for arms by DEXA (0.760), and waist circumference (0.746).
CONCLUSION
Overweight and obese premenopausal women diagnosed with metabolic syndrome had more abdominal fat according to various methods of measurement compared to normal women. Truncal fat amount measured by DEXA showed good performance in detecting metabolic syndrome as visceral fat area measured by CT did.