Prevalence of Diagnosed and Undiagnosed Obesity and Complications Found in Electronic Medical Record Database of a University Hospital

Abstract

At present, it is apparent that the incidence of obesity keeps increasing. It has also been discovered that there is a strong positive correlation between body mass index and the prevalence of chronic diseases. However, there are still many undiagnosed obesity patients. Therefore, the present research aimed to determine the prevalence of obesity in terms of underdiagnosed cases and chronic diseases in all obese patients from the Prince of Songkla University Hospital information system. This study employed a cross-sectional descriptive approach. We gathered data of all outpatients older than 18 years, excluding pregnancy cases. Data collection was taken from the hospital information system between 1 January 2016 and 31 December 2020. From 327,300 patients, a total of 135,112 patients were included in the study and 35.6% of patients met the Asia Pacific criteria for obesity (BMI ≥ 25 km/m²), but only 15.9% of them were given a diagnosis of obesity using Asia. The prevalence of 3 chronic conditions in obese patients was 21.3% for hypertension, 12.3% for type 2 diabetes mellitus, and 32.4% for dyslipidemia. Moreover, 9.5% of patients met the World Health Organization criteria for obesity (BMI ≥ 30 kg/m2), but only 33.5% of them were given a diagnosis of obesity. The prevalence of 3 chronic conditions in obese patients was 16.3% for hypertension, 18.8% for type 2 diabetes mellitus, and 11.3% for dyslipidemia. This present study showed that despite having a BMI exceeding the threshold for obesity, many people are still not given a diagnosis of obesity. Moreover, the prevalence of hypertension, type 2 diabetes mellitus, and dyslipidemia found among obese patients were lower than research in western countries.