Prevalence of overall and central obesity among adolescent girls in Port Harcourt: a comparison of different methods

Abstract

There is no universally accepted criterion for classifica-tion of overall weight status and central obesity in adolescents. Several criteria have been used which include that recommended by Centre for Disease control, World Health Organization and the International Obesity Task Force. Aim: The study compared various methods for determination of overall obesity in adolescents using the BMI percentiles recom-mended by the Centre for Disease Control (CDC), the International Obesity Task Force (IOTF) and the World Health Organization (WHO) BMI Z score and determi-nation of central obesity using the waist circumference (WC), Waist Hip Ratio (WHR) and Waist Height Ratio (WHtR).