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Korean J Obes 2013; 22(3): 137-144

Published online September 30, 2013

Copyright © Korean Society for the Study of Obesity.

Body Composition and Obesity in Korean Adolescents and its Impact
on Diabetes Mellitus

Hye Won Park,Sochung Chung*

Department of Pediatrics, Konkuk University Medical Center, Konkuk University School of Medicine

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

The prevalence of childhood obesity and diabetes is increasing worldwide including Korea and the global epidemic of obesity is an important public health issue.
Obesity is defined as a body mass index (BMI) for age and gender greater than the 95th percentile of a reference population. However, when assessing obesity, status of excessive fat should be considered, because BMI, the widely used obesity screening method, has limitations as a surrogate index for adiposity. To assess adiposity, applying body composition analysis could be helpful in differentiating fat mass (FM) from fat free mass (FFM). As the hallmark of adolescents is rapid somatic growth, sexual development with gender differentiation, and significant physical
compositional changes, the importance of body composition analysis is much greater in this age group. The prevalence of childhood and adolescent diabetes is also increasing and in certain cases it is difficult to diagnose the type of diabetes they have.
In this review diverse methods of assessing obesity will be introduced as in using body composition chart, plotting fat free mass index (FFMI) and fat mass index (FMI) from the FFM, and FM values derived from the result of body composition analysis. Also percent of body fat values
derived from Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES) for Korean adolescents will be presented. Finally, the impact of obesity on diabetes manifestation in the era of acceleration, usefulness of body composition chart in differentiating diabetes type and detecting atypical cases including double diabetes, and early strategy of diabetes management will be discussed.

Keywords: Adolescents, Body composition, Obesity, Diabetes mellitus


Characteristics of the Korean adolescents aged 10-19 years



Percentage body fat percentiles among Korean adolescents aged 10-19 years


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