Alpa Patel of American Cancer Society studied 1 million people.
By The American Bazaar Staff
WASHINGTON, DC: An Indian American researcher at the American Cancer Society has determined that both blacks and whites are at similar risk of early death if they are overweight or obese, contrary to earlier studies that were of the opinion that obese blacks were better off health wise than their white counterparts.
The study, conducted by Alpa V. Patel, PhD, of the American Cancer Society in Atlanta, Georgia, and colleagues, looked at more than one million people to see who was most at risk of dying early from excess weight.
The participants answered detailed questionnaires about their height, weight, lifestyle and eating habits in 1982. The average age of those in the study was 57 years old. They were then followed for 28 years. The study authors looked at the National Death Index to see who died during that time and when, according to a report in dailyRX.
There were 341,196 white men in the study, 12,559 black men, 550,556 white women and 25,560 black women. By the end of 2010, 50.5 percent of people in the study had died.
The researchers found that a higher BMI was most strongly associated with a higher risk of death — even among patients who had never smoked and did not have a prevalent disease.
BMI (body mass index) is a height- and weight-based measure of body fat. Prevalent disease is a history of illness, including cancer and heart disease.
People who never smoked and did not have other major health issues still faced a raised risk of death from being overweight or obese — regardless of their race, the study authors found.
The relationship between weight and risk of an early death “has not been well-characterized in African Americans,” Patel noted in a Society news release.
However, the new research “is very well-suited to address this issue because of its large size, including nearly a million participants and long-term follow-up of 28 years, making it the largest study to date in African Americans,” she said.
Increasing weight was associated with a higher risk of death than in people who were considered to be normal weight, except among black women, the researchers found. Heavier black women were at higher risk for death by being very overweight, but black women who were only slightly overweight did not face a significantly higher risk for death.
“Excess body weight is known to increase risk of premature death and risk of various chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, and many types of cancer,†the authors wrote.
Men and women who were underweight also faced a higher risk for death than normal-weight people, the study found.
The study was published October 8 in PLOS One.