Assessing overweight and obesity across mental disorders: personality disorders at high risk
Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 07/11/2012
Clinical Article
Stanley SH et al. – The proportion of obese people within the mental health system far exceeds that of the general population, with these people at a much greater risk of becoming obese. The highest level of obesity was found in people with a personality disorder rather than in people with psychosis.
Methods- Data were collected for all 508 male and female inpatients (new and already existing) in a public mental health service centre in Western Australia between January and December 2008.
- Current weight for all patients and weight gain for some patients were calculated to obtain a body mass index (BMI) value, and diagnostic information was aligned to one of the six major categories of mental illness.
- The percentage of obese inpatients (30.3 %) was much higher than that of the general population (21.4 %), with females showing a higher propensity toward obesity than males.
- Most diagnostic categories had a mean BMI in the overweight range, whereas Personality Disorders had a mean BMI in the obese range (30.07).
- A gradual increase in weight over a 9-month time period can be seen in most patients who were assessed on more than one occasion.
