Are new indexes of body fat distribution (VAI, BAI, WHtR) useful in assessing metabolic disturbances in obese individuals?
VAI, WC, and WHtR are useful clinical markers for assessing visceral adiposity and associated metabolic disturbances in obese individuals.
The results indicate that VAI, WC, and WHtR can be useful in the assessment of increased VAT accumulation associated with disturbances in glucose and lipid metabolism. BAI should be calculated separately for each sex, then it could be also useful for the prediction of disturbances in glucose metabolism. However, further studies are needed to recognise cut-off values for BAI, as a marker of body fatness, associated with adverse health effects.
Jabłonowska-Lietz et al. (Mon,) studied this question.