Anxiety, a common mood disorder, has many risk factors — such as genetic makeup and stress. Recently, researchers have been revealing the relevance of some more surprising risk factors. A new study from Latin America suggests that waist size may be one of them.

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New inquiry investigates the link between waist measurements and the risk of anxiety.

Feet disorders are now the "most common" mental status among adults in the United States, confirm the Anxiety and Depression Clan of America.

Women are twice as likely to be diagnosed with anxiety every bit men, and they are also more probable to overeat due to stress.

Moreover, anxiety has also been associated with the appearance of cardiometabolic diseases, such every bit coronary heart disease and diabetes.

A new study from Latin America that focused on postmenopausal women now suggests that the risk of developing a form of anxiety afterwards in life may have something to do with the size of a woman's waistline.

The researchers, who hail from many institutions beyond Latin American countries — including Peru, Republic of chile, and Ecuador — found correlations between women's waist-to-height ratio and her adventure of being diagnosed with anxiety.

The paper — whose kickoff author is Dr. Karen Approach, from the School of Medicine at Universidad Peruana de Ciencias Aplicadas in Lima, Peru — that reports the researchers' findings has been published in the periodical Menopause.

Dr. Arroyo and her colleagues worked with 5,580 women with a hateful age of 49.seven years. Of these participants, 58 percent were postmenopausal, and 61.3 percent said that they lived with anxiety.

The scientists examined data related to women'due south weight and height to determine whether or non in that location was any association between waist size and the take a chance of developing anxiety.

According to the researchers, this is the first time that waist-to-height ratio, specifically, has been examined to uncover a link with anxiety disorders. The waist-to-peak ratio has previously been looked to as an indicator of cardiometabolic hazard — which, every bit aforementioned, has been tied to mood disorders including anxiety.

The waist-to-meridian ratio is determined by dividing waist circumference measurements by elevation measurements, and a woman is typically obese if her waist size equals more than half her height measurements.

In the current study, Dr. Approach and colleagues divided the participants into 3 groups — lower, middle, and upper tertile — based on their calculated waist-to-elevation ratios.

To begin with, the squad found that the women in the heart and upper tertiles were at significantly higher risk of having feet than their peers in the lower tertile.

All the same, afterwards adjusting for relevant factors, they saw that only the women in the uppermost tertile were more likely to showroom telling signs of anxiety.

In short, the larger a woman'due south waistline, the more probable she is to experience feet.

Previous studies have shown that postmenopausal women are more likely to accept anxiety and that their quality of life is sometimes severely affected by it, and some research suggested an overlap between the physiological furnishings of menopause, such as hot flashes, and symptoms of anxiety.

Dr. JoAnn Pinkerton — who is the executive manager of the North American Menopause Order — explains that this study's findings may assistance to improve the health guidelines offered to women at later stages in life.

"Hormone changes," she explains, "may be involved in the development of both anxiety and abdominal obesity because of their roles in the brain as well as in fat distribution."

"This study provides valuable insights for healthcare providers treating middle-aged women, because it implies that waist-to-tiptop ratio could be a good marker for evaluating patients for anxiety."

Dr. JoAnn Pinkerton