Setting The Stage For Obesity Staging
Monday, August 15, 2011
Rather than BMI (a measure of weight), the Edmonton Obesity Staging System (EOSS) ranks severity of obesity based on clinical assessment of weight-related health problems, mental health and quality of life. We proposed that this system would provide a far better guide to clinical decision making than using BMI class alone.
For reasons that will become apparent later this week, I would like to repost an excerpt from this original proposal for this system, which was first posted on this blog on March 30, 2008:
Current definitions of obesity based on BMI and waist circumference (WC), while widely accepted, are hardly helpful in counseling individual patients. Readers of my blog are probably quite familiar with my views on this.
As most clinicians will readily agree, when dealing with indiviual patients, both measures lack sensitivity and specificity with regard to identifying the presence or risk of obesity-related risk factors, comorbidities, psychopathology, global functioning or quality of life.
In fact recent epidemiological studies emphasize that good health including low morbidity and mortality is possible over a wide range of BMI. Thus, basing the decision on who to treat and who to leave well alone solely on measures of weight or size is neither sensible nor does justice to the complexity of the relationship between excess body fat and its impact on health and well-being. The well-established obesity-chronic disease paradox makes decisions on who to treat and who not to treat even more uncertain.
Telling healthy large people who have no apparent comorbidities, functional limitations or reduced well-being to lose weight may be counterproductive in that it can introduce and reinforce dissatisfaction with body image, foster frustrations and despair (given the poor long-term success of weight loss attempts) and lead to unhealthy behaviours focusing on weight loss (e.g. excessive exercise or dieting) rather than on healthy lifestyles (which are possible at almost any weight).
Thus, for practical purposes, it is important to move beyond defining who needs obesity treatment simply based on BMI and/or WC to a more clinically meaningful system.
Indeed, what we direly need is a classification of obesity that is clinically relevant in that it helps identify patients who have or are at high-risk of obesity-related complications and are most likely to benefit from treatment.
…..
Now I am no expert on disease classification and realise the large amount of work and consensus meetings that go into developing these classification systems. But I am a clinician, who regularly sees patients and would be happy to see even the simplest form of staging that provides a meaningful framework.
The simplest classification I can think of would be to use a staging system similar to the following:
Stage 0: no apparent obesity-related risk factors (blood pressure, lipids, glucose, etc.), physical symptoms, psychopathology, functional limitations, or impairment of well-being
Stage 1: presence of obesity-related sub-clinical risk factors (elevated blood pressure, impaired fasting glucose, fatty liver, etc.), mild physical symptoms (dyspnea on moderate exertion, occasional aches and pains, etc.), mild psychopathology, mild functional limitations or mild impairment of well-being
Stage 2: presence of established obesity-related chronic disease like hypertension, type 2 diabetes, sleep apnea, osteoarthritis, reflux disease, polycystic ovary syndrome, depression, anxiety disorder, moderate limitations in activities of daily living and/or well being.
Stage 3: established end-organ damage like myocardial infarction, diabetic complications, severe osteoarthritis, significant psychopathology, significant functional limitations and impairment of well-being
Stage 4: severe (end-stage?) disabilities from obesity-related chronic disease, severe disabling psychopathology, severe functional limitations and severe impairment of well-being
Thus, for e.g., a 24 year-old physically active female with a BMI of 32 with no measurable risk factors, functional limitations or self-esteem issues would have Class I, Stage 0 Obesity – benefits of treatment will be marginal or non-existent.
A 32 year-old male with BMI of 36 with hypertension and sleep apnea would have Class III, Stage 2 Obesity – definite indication for obesity treatment.
A 45 year-old female with BMI of 54 who is in a wheel chair because of severe gonarthritis with severe hypoventilaltion would have Class III, Stage 4 Obesity – will require aggressive obesity treatment unless deemed palliative.
Stay tuned for more on the Edmonton Obesity Staging System this week.
AMS
Edmonton, Alberta
Sharma AM, & Kushner RF (2009). A proposed clinical staging system for obesity. International journal of obesity (2005), 33 (3), 289-95 PMID: 19188927
