January 29, 2015 – Fit and Fat

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Anchor lead:  Can you be fit even if you’re fat? Elizabeth Tracey reports

Obese people sometimes argue that even though they’re overweight, they work out and they’re healthy.  Now a research letter in the journal Circulation seems to dispel that notion.  Redonda Miller, an internal medicine expert at Johns Hopkins, describes the research.

Miller: The investigators defined obese as a BMI over thirty, and defined quote “healthy” as having less than two risk factors. And the risk factors included things such as low HDL, high LDL, diabetes markers, high blood pressure.  At five years 31.8% had become unhealthy, meaning they had two or more of these risk factors.  At ten years even higher and at 20 years over half of them at 51.5%.    :27

Miller says other deleterious consequences of obesity, such as knee osteoarthritis, back problems, or an increased risk of certain cancers, were not addressed in this study but certainly argue for continued weight loss efforts for those who are overweight.  At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.