Association of waist circumference, body mass index and conicity index with cardiovascular risk factors in postmenopausal women

In menopause, changes in body fat distribution lead to increasing risk of cardiovascular disease and metabolic disorders. The aim of this study was to assess the association of adiposity using the conicity index (CI), body mass index (BMI) and waist circumference (WC) with cardiovascular risk factors (hypertension, diabetes and dyslipidaemia). The sample of this cross-sectional study was collected from June to October 2010 and 165 consecutive menopausal women who had attended the Health and Treatment Centre and Endocrine Research Centre of Firoozgar Hospital in Tehran, Iran were assessed. Age, weight, height, WC, waist-hip ratio (WHR), CI and fat mass were measured. Systolic and diastolic blood pressure (SBP and DBP), fasting blood glucose, insulin, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) and total cholesterol (TC) levels were also determined. All statistical analyses were performed by SPSS version 17 (SPSS Inc, Chicago, IL, USA). Results showed that BMI was positively and significantly associated with SBP (r = 0.21; p = 0.009). WC was positively and significantly correlated with SBP (r = 0.26; p = 0.02) and DBP (r = 0.16; p = 0.05). WHR was also significantly and positively associated with SBP (r = 0.29; p = 0.001). Age and WC were associated with CI quartiles at the 0.05 significance level. The correlation of CI quartiles with SBP and weight were at the 0.01 significance level. We showed a significant association of WC with SBP and DBP, and that BMI could be an important determining factor of SBP. For assessing the association between CI and cardiovascular risk factors, future studies with larger sample sizes are recommended.