Excess weight confers an increased risk of premature death and shorter life expectancy; a bibliographic survey

Abstract

Introduction: Obesity is a chronic multifactorial disease considered a global epidemic by the World Health Organization (WHO). The body mass index (BMI) is used internationally for diagnosis and classification, a BMI> 30kg/m2 is a diagnosis of obesity and it correlates positively with the relative risk of general and cardiovascular mortality. Objectives: The main objective of this work is to make known the impact of this disease through a systematic review of the most recent publications. Results: The prevalence of overweight and obesity is increasing alarmingly worldwide, affecting more than 50% of the adult population in the European Union and tripling the number of obese over the last twenty years. Due to this large increase, obesity has become a major threat for the whole world, being a major risk factor for cardiovascular diseases and causal factor of other cardiovascular risk factors such as hypertension, diabetes mellitus and dyslipemias, thus increasing morbidity and mortality of these people. It also has association with alterations to other levels such as OSAS, non-alcoholic hepatic steatosis, increased risk of complications during gestation, association with osteoarthrosis and cancer, among others. Conclusions: Excess weight confers an increased risk of premature death and shorter life expectancy so, a multidisciplinary approach focused on weight loss is first needed. Prevention is the key to its control.

Keywords

• obesity;
• mortality
• morbidity
• cardiovascular risk
• . obesity epidemiology