According to scientists at the University of Oxford (Great Britain), pinching your waistline and measuring the extra centimeters would be just as reliable as monitoring your body mass index (BMI) to know your heart risk.
After studying the health records of 430,000 people between the ages of 40 and 70, they even claim that monitoring visceral fat should take priority over the pounds on the scale. “Each inch (the equivalent of 2.5 cm, editor’s note) too much around the belly increases the risk of heart failure by 11%” they say. “And the risk of heart attack increases by 4% for each extra centimeter”.
Participants had an average age of 56, and over the 13-year follow-up period, researchers recorded 8,669 heart failure diagnoses, with some resulting in patient death.
Visceral fat causes inflammation
“We know that visceral adipose tissue – the fat that surrounds the organs of the abdomen – is very active and contains many inflammatory factors that can cause cardiovascular disease” explained Dr Ayodipupo Oguntade, lead author of this study, during the congress of the European Society of Cardiology, in Barcelona.
“A too large waist circumference is a sign that you have too much visceral fat and that the functioning of the heart and blood vessels is impaired” insists the doctor who recommends the establishment of a follow-up of the waist circumference by the doctor. “Well more important than body mass index”.
