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. 2009 Jun;32(6):1104-6.
doi: 10.2337/dc08-1674. Epub 2009 Mar 26.

BMI and diabetes risk in Singaporean Chinese

Andrew O Odegaard  1 , Woon-Puay Koh, Gabrielle Vazquez, Kazuko Arakawa, Hin-Peng Lee, Mimi C Yu, Mark A Pereira
Affiliations

BMI and diabetes risk in Singaporean Chinese

Andrew O Odegaard et al. Diabetes Care. 2009 Jun.

Abstract

Objective: Increased BMI is a robust risk factor for type 2 diabetes. Paradoxically, South Asians have relatively low BMIs despite their high prevalence of type 2 diabetes. We examined the association between BMI and incident type 2 diabetes because detailed prospective cohort data on this topic in Asians are scarce.

Research design and methods: This study was a prospective analysis of 37,091 men and women aged 45-74 years in the Singapore Chinese Health Study, using Cox regression analysis.

Results: Risk of incident type 2 diabetes significantly increased beginning with BMIs 18.5-23.0 kg/m(2)(relative risk 2.47 [95% CI 1.75-3.48]) and continued in a monotonic fashion across the spectrum of BMI. Results were stronger for younger than for older adults.

Conclusions: BMIs considered lean and normal in Singaporean Chinese are strongly associated with increased risk of incident type 2 diabetes. This association weakened with advanced age but remained significant.

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