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A New Tool Needed for Identifying and Characterizing Obesity

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Abstract

Obesity is a highly prevalent condition across the world with serious medical, psychological, and social consequences. Unfortunately, widely used simple tools to identify obesity or excess adiposity such as body mass index and waist circumference have serious shortcomings including lack of accuracy and accepted standards associated with increased health risk. Furthermore, many people with excess adiposity have little or no metabolic disturbance or increased risk for cardiovascular disease or mortality. A practical tool which incorporates several simple measures to accurately identify obese individuals at increased risk is desperately needed. The characteristics of such a potential tool are described.

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Correspondence to Goutham Rao.

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Rao, G. A New Tool Needed for Identifying and Characterizing Obesity. Curr Cardiovasc Risk Rep 7, 85–87 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12170-013-0296-y

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