Having a large waistline can as much as double your risk of a premature death, even if your body mass index falls within a normal range, a new European study says.
Researchers found that male subjects who had a waistline of more than 120 centimetres and females who had a waistline measuring more than 100 centimetres had twice the risk of premature death compared to men and women who had normal waistlines.
A normal waistline size was about 80 centimetres in men and about 65 centimetres in women.
The study also found that every five centimetre increase in waist circumference increased premature mortality risk by 17 per cent in men and 13 per cent in women.
"Our study shows that accumulating excess fat around your middle can put your health at risk even if your weight is normal based on body mass index scores," Prof. Elio Riboli, European coordinator of the study from Imperial College London, said in a statement. "There aren't many simple individual characteristics that can increase a person's risk of premature death to this extent, independently from smoking and drinking."
The study included more than 350,000 subjects from all over Europe. The findings are published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
For their research, the team also measured the ratio of waist size to hip size, which is calculated by dividing the waist measurement by the hip measurement.
A lower waist-hip ratio indicates that the waist is relatively small compared to the hips.
The researchers found that every 0.1 unit increase in waist-hip-ratio was linked to a 34 per cent higher mortality risk in men and a 24 per cent higher risk in women.
The overall increase in mortality risk could be linked to fat storage around the waistline, which is known to secrete hormones that contribute to the development of chronic disease, particularly heart disease and cancer.
The study suggests that doctors should measure a patient's waistline and hip size, in addition to their body mass index, as part of standard health care, the researchers said.
"The good news is that you don't need to take an expensive test and wait ages for the result to assess this aspect of your health - it costs virtually nothing to measure your waist and hip size," Riboli said. "Doctors and nurses can easily identify people who need to take certain steps to improve their health by routinely monitoring these measurements."
The researchers suggest that those with larger waistlines take measures to lose weight, including exercising more, eating a healthy diet and avoiding excessive alcohol consumption.
