Do Metabolically Healthy People with Obesity Have a Lower Health-Related Quality of Life? A Prospective Cohort Study in Taiwan

The association between metabolically healthy obesity (MHO) and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) has not been thoroughly evaluated. This study enrolled 906 adult participants aged 35–55 years between 2009 and 2010 in Northern Taiwan; 427 participants were followed up after eight years. Normal weight, overweight, and obesity were evaluated via body mass index. Metabolic health was defined as the absence of cardiometabolic diseases and having ≤1 metabolic risk factor. HRQOL was evaluated using the 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36), Taiwan version. Generalized linear mixed-effects models were used to analyze the repeated, measured data with adjustment for important covariates. Compared with metabolically healthy normal weight individuals, participants with metabolically unhealthy normal weight and obesity had a significantly poorer physical component summary score (β (95% CI) = −2.17 (−3.38–−0.97) and −2.29 (−3.70–−0.87), respectively). There were no significant differences in physical and mental component summary scores among participants with metabolically healthy normal weight, overweight, and obesity. This study showed that metabolically healthy individuals with obesity and normal weight had similar HRQOL in physical and mental component summary scores. Maintaining metabolic health is an ongoing goal for people with obesity.