Belly Fat Research and Natural Solutions

It has long been recognized that people who carry their excess weight around their middles -- those who are apple-shaped instead of pear-shaped -- have a higher risk for heart attacks and strokes.

Recent research also suggests a link between belly fat and a range of other diseases, including diabetes, some cancers, and even age-related dementias. Researchers used two measures of abdominal obesity -- waist circumference and waist-to-hip ratio -- in their attempt to better understand the role of belly fat in early death.

Specifically:

Men and women with the largest waists (more than 40 inches for men and 35 inches for women) had roughly double the risk of premature death as men and women with the smallest waists (less than 34 inches for men and 28 for women).

Each 2-inch increase in waist circumference was associated with close to a 17% increase in mortality in men and a 13% increase in women.

Waist-to-hip ratio also strongly predicted mortality.

"The most important result of our study is the finding that not just being overweight, but also the distribution of body fat, affects the risk of premature death," The findings come as no surprise to University of Michigan cardiologist and research scientist Daniel Eitzman, MD.

Work by Eitzman and colleagues found that belly fat -- also known as visceral fat -- produces more inflammation than fat found in other areas of the body. Inflammation is thought to play a key role in heart disease and a host of other chronic diseases.

"Studies like this focus attention on the importance of measuring visceral fat, which is not now routinely done in clinical practice," he says.

So get those measuring tapes out and take account!

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