Complain about a product or service

Pot Belly a Tip-Off Of Heart Disease

Better to waste food than add it to your waist

August 14, 2007

• Obesity Causes Over 124,000 New Cancers A Year In Europe • Exercise Minimizes Weight Regain, Study Says • CSPI Slams Domino's New Pasta As Unhealthy 'Food Porn' • FDA Conducting Safety Review Of Weight Loss Drug • Obesity Costs U.S. About $147 Billion Annually • New Insights Gained Into Causes Of Anorexia • CDC Launches Obesity Website • Modest Exercise Can Reduce Negative Effects of Belly Fat • Keep The Faith and Lose The Weight? • Families That Eat Together Means Kids Eating Better • New Factor in Teen Obesity: Parents • Possible Drug Target Found for Obesity Treatment • Weight Management Requires "Lifelong Commitment" • Obama Urged to Tackle Obesity • 5 Tips for Eating Right in 2009 • "All You Can Eat" A Ticket to Obesity • Sour Economy May Affect Eating Habits • Fast Food Has Fewer Calories Than Traditional Restaurant Meals --- • Weight Loss News • Childhood Obesity

Size matters. New research shows that adding several inches to the waist — even if body weight still falls within a normal range — markedly increases the risk of unhealthy plaque build-up in the arteries of the heart and the rest of the body.

The research, conducted at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, appears in the August 21, 2007, issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC).

According to the study, the relationship of the waist measurement to the hip measurement was much more closely tied to early, hidden signs of heart disease than other common measures of obesity, such as body mass index (BMI) or the waist circumference alone.

In other words, we may obsess about unsightly cellulite on our hips, but it’s the pot belly we ought to worry about.

“In our thirties and forties, we often gain three to four inches in the midsection,” said James A. de Lemos, M.D., F.A.C.C., a professor of medicine and director of the Coronary Care Unit at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.

“It’s a day-to-day, meal-to-meal battle, but it’s worth fighting. Even a small pot belly puts us at higher risk when compared to a flat tummy.”

For the study, Dr. de Lemos and his colleagues examined data from the ongoing Dallas Heart Study, which is evaluating risk factors for heart disease in a large, multiethnic, urban population with a median age of 45.

The new sub-study focused on a group of 2,744 participants who had noninvasive imaging tests to look for early signs of plaque build-up in the arteries, which signals an increased risk of developing cardiovascular disease later in life.

Electron-beam computed tomography (EBCT) was used to identify calcium deposits in the arteries of the heart. These deposits indicate the onset of so-called hardening of the arteries, and can be detected years before a person experiences chest pain or has a heart attack.

Researchers then examined the relationship between body shape and early signs of arterial disease. They found that the likelihood of calcium being found in the arteries of the heart grew in direct proportion to increases in the waist-to-hip ratio (WHR).

In addition, when they divided the WHR into five groups from smallest to largest, they found that people with the largest WHR were nearly twice as likely to have calcium deposits in their coronary arteries as those with the smallest WHR.

The relationship between WHR and arterial plaque remained strong even after other risk factors, such as blood pressure, diabetes, age, smoking and high cholesterol levels were taken into account.

“Middle-aged spread is not healthy,” Dr. de Lemos said. “We don’t have to clean our plates. It’s better to throw food out than add it to our waists.”

Report Your Experience
If you've had a bad experience -- or a good one -- with a consumer product or service, we'd like to hear about it. All complaints are reviewed by class action attorneys and are considered for publication on our site. Knowledge is power! Help spread the word. File your consumer report now.

Share		Follow us on Twitter.