Introduction.

Excess weight represents a problem in the adult population, has increased in recent years and is associated with noncommunicable diseases.

Objectives.

To make comparisons between anthropometric measurements and indices and to evaluate their relationship with individual and sociodemographic variables to generate information on the use of the main measurements in the evaluation of general and abdominal obesity as indicators of cardiovascular risk.

Materials and methods

. Secondary analysis of the ENSIN survey for Colombia with data collected between 2015 and 2016, the 2005 Population and Housing Census of the Departamento Administrativo Nacional de Estadística (DANE) was used as a sampling frame. The sample was 44,202 households with 151,343 people aged 0 to 64 years; 70,315 records of adult population were selected for this analysis. Proportions, confidence intervals, measures of central tendency and dispersion were calculated.

Results.

The means of body mass index (BMI) and waist-height index were higher than the cutoff point in both sexes, while the means of waist circumference were below the cutoff point for men and higher for women (p<0.05). The prevalence of obesity by BMI was 17.5%, while abdominal obesity by waist circumference and waist-height index of 50.2% and 62.6% respectively.

Conclusions.

Abdominal obesity regardless of the indicator used, is about 3 times higher than general obesity by BMI and waist-height index identifies more people, especially men, with abdominal obesity compared to waist circumference.

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