Characterisation of body size phenotypes in a middle-aged Maltese population

Obesity is increasingly recognised as being a heterogeneous disease. Some obese individuals may present a metabolically healthy profile (metabolically healthy obese (MHO)), while some normal weight individuals exhibit an adverse cardiometabolic phenotype (metabolically unhealthy normal weight individuals (MUHNW)). The objectives of the present study were to examine the prevalence and associated characteristics of the different body composition phenotypes within a Maltese cohort. This was a cross-sectional analysis involving 521 individuals aged 41 ± 5 years. The metabolically unhealthy state was defined as the presence of ≥2 metabolic syndrome components (NCEP-ATPIII parameters), while individuals with ≤1 cardiometabolic abnormalities were classified as metabolically healthy. Overall, 70 % of the studied population was overweight or obese and 30⋅7 % had ≥2 cardiometabolic abnormalities. The prevalence of MHO and MUHNW was 10⋅7 and 2⋅1 %, respectively. Individuals with the healthy phenotype were more likely to consume alcohol, participate in regular physical activity and less likely to be smokers. While the MHO phenotype had similar values for waist, hip and neck circumferences, waist–hip ratio and insulin resistance when compared with MUHNW individuals, there was a lower proportion of MHO subjects having a high fasting plasma glucose, hypertriglyceridaemia or low HDL-C when compared with the unhealthy lean individuals. A high prevalence of the metabolically unhealthy phenotype was observed in this relatively young population which may result in significant future cardiovascular disease burden if timely assessment and management of modifiable risk factors are not implemented. Furthermore, the present study suggests that the MHO phenotype is not totally benign as previously thought.