cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk such as total serum cholesterol, triglycerides, blood glucose and a progressive reduction of HDL-cholesterol, with a clear-cut increase in the incidence of all-cause and cardiovascular deaths as well as of cardiovascular morbid and fatal events[30]. In post-menopausal women, it was reported that both BMI and WC were associated with mortality, but WC may be more important than BMI[31], as it reflects abdominal fat levels. In the Nurses’ Health Study, waist-to-hip ratio and WC were also independently strongly associated with increased risk of coronary heart disease among women with a BMI of < 25 kg/m2[32]. WC reflects abdominal or intra-abdominal fat, and hip circumference reflects different aspects of body composition in the gluteo-femoral region, i.e., muscle mass, bone, and fat mass. The importance of waist and hip measurements, and the waist to hip ratio, lies in the apparently different physical and metabolic characteristics of these two regions, and therefore the diverse clinical outcomes in subjects with a gynoid (low waist to hip ratio, lower body obesity) or android (high waist to hip ratio, upper body obesity) body conformation. This may be due to the tendency for abdominal adipocytes to enlarge (hypertrophy) whereas subcutaneous femoral adipocytes increase in number (hyperplasia), perhaps due to increased levels of the adipogenic transcription factors CCAAT/ enhancer-binding protein (C/EBP; GeneBank accession No: NC_000019) and peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-2 (PPAR2; GeneBank accession No: NC_000003) in hypertrophic adipocytes[33]. Hypertrophic adipocytes tend to be associated with dyslipidemia and insulin resistance[34]. It has been suggested that the composition of gluteal fat deposits correspond more closely with that of visceral deposits rather than femoral deposits[35].
In conclusion, diagnosis, therapy and follow up of all subtypes of obesity must not be based on “body weight” parameter, but body composition parameters and energetic expenditure are required.
To overcome misclassifications, direct measure¬ments of PBF, by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), computerized tomography (CT), dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA), bioimpedence analysis, total body water or hydrometry, and skinfold thickness would be a better tool for diagnosing the obese phenotypes (Figure 1).