Metabolically Healthy Obesity - An Oxymoron Or Medical Reality?

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Dennett, C. (2017). Metabolically healthy obesity - an oxymoron or medical reality? Today’s Dietitian. 19(1) 30. http://www.todaysdietitian.com/newarchives/0117p30.shtml

          What is metabolically healthy obesity? This is a phenomenon of sorts where some individuals are healthy despite long-standing 

obesity and metabolic syndrome. It challenges there paradigm that obesity itself will lead to metabolic and cardiovascular disorders. It 

is estimated that only about 6% of obese people are considered metabolically healthy, having no risk factors whatsoever other than 

their weight itself. Overall research suggests that these individuals still have a higher risk of chronic illnesses than metabolically 

healthy people with lower BMIs, but do have a lower chance than their obese counterparts. Theories suggest metabolically healthy 

obesity my be a results of genetic disposition, diet and lifestyle factors, or both. Another reason is that BMI can not accurately 

distinguish between lean muscle mass or body fat so if someone has a high BMI, but low fat mass, or vice versa, BMI results can be 

misleading. BMI also says nothing about genetic disposition.


          Other studies have shown that metabolically healthy obesity is just a delay of metabolic disease onset due to obesity. Long-

term studies have shown that one-third to two-thirds of these individuals who are considered “metabolically healthy obese” eventually 

develop chronic illnesses, just later in life because of a delay of onset. There have been few randomized trials to asses whether 

weight loss actually improves metabolic health in these individuals and more studies need to be done. 

-DU

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