Aim This study aims to explore an alternative, cost‐effective approach by evaluating body measurements as a potential tool for identifying insulin resistance (IR) in a Mixed‐Ancestry population in Cape Town, South Africa. Materials and Methods Biochemical and clinical data were collected by trained staff and standardised techniques were used to collect anthropometric measurements as set out by the World Health Organisation (WHO). For participants without clinical diagnoses of diabetes, an oral glucose tolerance test was administered, and diabetes status was defined as per the WHO criteria. Results From the 1385 participants, 224 were identified as being insulin‐resistant, while 1161 were not. When comparing body measurements per IR status, the insulin‐resistant group had higher body measurements in comparison to the control group (all p < 0.001). Correlating the HOMA‐IR and body measurements, both genders demonstrated positive weak to moderate correlations. Thus, we assessed the anthropometric measurements as potential diagnostic markers of IR using the ROC curves and HOMA‐IR as the standard reference. From this analysis, the area under the curve for all measurements revealed a moderate‐to‐good diagnostic accuracy, with waist circumference (WC) performing the best in both sexes. Conclusion Based on these results, we concluded that anthropometric measurements, such as WC and waist‐to‐height ratio, may have good diagnostic accuracy when using HOMA‐IR as a reference standard for IR. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study focused on a Mixed‐Ancestry population, and it may lay the groundwork for future research in South Africa and Africa.
Davids et al. (Thu,) studied this question.