Introduction.

Obesity is usually diagnosed based only on body mass index (BMI), which may lead to an unreliable body composition analysis.

Objective:

To analyze the body characteristics of morbidly obese (class III) women referred to bariatric surgery using the compartment model of body composition analysis.

Materials and methods:

Cross-sectional study conducted in 2017 in 14 morbidly obese women aged between 25 and 51 years, who attended clinical and physical therapy assessment prior to undergoing bariatric surgery at a university hospital in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Body composition analysis was performed using an octopolar bioimpedance scale. The Pearson's correlation coefficient was used to analyze the correlation between variables, with a significance level of p<0.05.

Results:

A high mean percentage of fat body was observed (51.2%), mainly in the trunk. BMI was correlated with total fat in kilograms (r=0.93), total body fat percentage (TBF%) (r=0.67), total body water (r=0.63), and muscle mass (r=o.6o); besides, a moderate correlation with the waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) was found (r=0.55). WHR showed a correlation with TBF% (r=o.6o) and a moderate correlation with total fat in kilograms (r=0.57). Moreover, the sarcopenia index was correlated with muscle mass (r=0.79) and total body water (r=0.78). All these correlations were statistically significant (p<0.05). There were no sarcopenia cases.

Conclusion:

A higher concentration of fat in the trunk and the upper limbs was observed in the study population; however, none of the participants had sarcopenia. On the other hand, BMI showed a stronger correlation with both total fat (kg) and TBF% than with WHR. Such findings suggest that assessing these patients based only on BMI or WHR may hinder the development individualized treatment strategies.

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