Abdominal Obesity Perception in Turkish Population

Letter to the Editor Abdominal Obesity Perception in Turkish Population To the Editor: We have read ‘‘Body Size Perception Among African American Women’’ by Lynch and Kane1 with great interest. The authors pointed out that diversity in body size perception in different communities may serve as a barrier to managing obesity. To give an example of the diversity mentioned, we would like to share data we have collected from the Turkish population. We conducted a nationwide research in Turkey to identify cardiovascular risk factors in the Turkish population. Along with other cardiometabolic risk factors, we asked whether participants thought they were abdominally obese, and measured their waist circumference. Participants’ data were analyzed according to the International Diabetes Foundation (IDF) definition for European countries and the National Cholesterol Education Program Adult Treatment Panel III (ATP III) definition, which are, respectively, $ 94 cm for men and $ 80 cm for women, and > 102 cm for men and > 88 cm for women. Among 875 participants (287 men and 597 women), 148 men and 475 women with IDF criteria and 63 men and 322 women with ATP III criteria were abdominally obese. Among

abdominally obese participants according to IDF criteria, 74% of women and 66% of men thought they were abdominally fat. The rates were 81% for women and 70% for men according to ATP III criteria. A total of 133 female participants without abdominal obesity according to ATP III criteria (49%) and 44 according to IDF criteria (38%) considered themselves to be abdominally fat. Although not abdominally obese, using ATP III criteria, 88 male participants (38%) found themselves to be abdominally fat; using IDF criteria, 28 thought they were (22%). We found awareness of abdominal obesity to be higher than the rates reported by Lynch and Kane, in concordance with the authors’ statement that self-perception of body size is different in different cultures. Aytekin Oguz, MD Department of Internal Medicine Faculty of Medicine Istanbul Medeniyet University Istanbul, Turkey Ahmet Temizhan, MD Cardiology Clinic Turkey Yuksek Ihtisas Training and Research Hospital Ankara, Turkey

Yuksel Altuntas, MD Department of Internal Medicine Division of Endocrinology Metabolism Diabetes Sisli Etfal Education and Research Hospital Istanbul, Turkey Kubilay Karsidag, MD Department of Endocrinology Istanbul Medical School Istanbul University Istanbul, Turkey Sadi Gulec, MD Cardiology Department Ankara University School of Medicine Ankara, Turkey Ozge Telci Caklili, MD Department of Internal Medicine Goztepe Training and Research Hospital Istanbul Medeniyet University Kadikoy/Istanbul, Turkey

REFERENCE 1. Lynch EB, Kane J. Body size perception among African American women. J Nutr Educ Behav. 2014;46:412-417.

J Nutr Educ Behav. 2015;47:e11 Ó2015 SOCIETY FOR NUTRITION EDUCATION AND BEHAVIOR http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jneb.2014.12.009

Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior  Volume 47, Number 2, 2015

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