Treatment of obesity: need to focus on high risk abdominally obese patients

Editorial by Little and Byrne It is generally accepted that obesity is a health hazard because of its association with numerous metabolic complications such as dyslipidaemia, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases.1 On that basis, health agencies 2 3 have proposed that obesity should be defined on the basis of weight in kg expressed over height in m2, the so called body mass index,4 initially described by Quetelet in 1869 (table)....