Effect of body mass index on gender difference in lung functions in Indian population

International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Physiology

  • Anugya Aparajita Behera1Department of Physiology, IMS and SUM Medical College, Bhubaneswar, Odisha, INDIA.
  • Basanta Kumar Behera2Department of Community Medicine, Kalinga Institute of Medical Sciences, KIIT University, Bhubaneswar, Odisha, INDIA.
  • Somnath Dash3Department of Pulmonary Medicine, GSL Medical College, Rajahmundry, Andhra Pradesh, INDIA.
  • Soumya Mishra4Department of Physiology, JIPMER, Puducherry, INDIA.

Volume 1 Issue 3 Pages 229-231

DOI: 10.4103/2348-8093.143500

Abstract

Lung function tests have been known to be associated with a variety of factors such as age, sex, race, ethnicity, height, weight, chest circumference, waist circumference, waist-hip ratio, body mass index (BMI), etc. Increasing trend of obesity in developing country such as India leads to change in pulmonary function tests. The present study was undertaken to assess how BMI contributes to change in vital capacity (VC), forced expiratory volume in 1 s (FEV1), forced vital capacity (FVC), ratio between FEV1 and FVC (FEV1/FVC) and peak expiratory flow rate (PEFR) and if there was any difference between patterns in males and females. The 60 healthy subjects were included in the present study within the age group of 20–65 years. The BMI of each subject was calculated, and correlation was done between BMI and the lung function parameters. In males, PEFR was correlated with BMI, while in females it was significantly correlated with VC, FEV1, FVC, and PEFR. Applying multivariate analysis, we obtained odds ratio that supported females had a stronger correlation when compared to males. BMI contributes independently to pulmonary function tests, and the correlation pattern was different for males and females.

Keywords

  • Body mass index
  • gender-difference
  • pulmonary function tests
  • vital capacity
International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Physiology

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