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Obesity Among Adults by Year, New Mexico and U.S., 1998 to 2019

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Why Is This Important?

Obesity is associated with an increased risk for a number of other chronic diseases, including heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and a number of cancers (endometrial, colon, kidney, esophageal, post-menopausal breast, liver, pancreas, gallbladder, stomach, ovary, thyroid, meningioma, and multiple myeloma.) In both New Mexico and the United States, the percentage of adults who are obese, based on telephone survey data, has more than doubled since 1990. Excess weight also contributes to the development of arthritis, a chronic disease that is the leading cause of disability amongst adults in the nation and the state. Obesity has been identified as a population health priority for the New Mexico Department of Health along with diabetes, substance misuse, and unintended teen pregnancy.

  • Break*Break in the trend line for BRFSS weighting method difference.

Definition

The adult obesity prevalence is reported as the percent of BRFSS respondents whose self-reported height and weight corresponds to a Body Mass Index (BMI) equal to or greater than 30.0. Obesity is defined as having a Body Mass Index (BMI) equal to or greater than 30.0 kg/m2. BMI is calculated as: [[weight (in pounds) / [height (in inches)]2] x 703]. BMI is a measure of a person's weight in relationship to height. Obesity refers to excessive body fat. For most adults, BMI is strongly correlated with total body fat, and serves as a good surrogate measure for obesity.

Data Notes

U.S. value is the median value for all states and the District of Columbia. Estimates for 2011 and forward should not be compared to earlier years (please refer to Data Interpretation Issues, below).

Data Sources

  • Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System Survey Data, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, together with New Mexico Department of Health, Injury and Behavioral Epidemiology Bureau.
    (https://www.nmhealth.org/about/erd/ibeb/brfss/)
  • U.S. data source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) Prevalence and Trends Data.
    (https://www.cdc.gov/brfss/brfssprevalence)

How the Measure is Calculated

Numerator:Number of obese adults from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System survey.
Denominator:Number of adults from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System survey.

Data Issues

The Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) is an ongoing survey of adults about health-related behaviors, health conditions, and preventive services. Data are collected in all 50 states, D.C., and U.S. territories. The survey is conducted using scientific telephone survey methods for landline and cellular phones (with cellular since 2011). The landline phone portion of the survey excludes adults living in group quarters such as college dormitories, nursing homes, military barracks, and prisons. The cellular phone portion of the survey includes adult students living in college dormitories but excludes other group quarters. Beginning with 2011, the BRFSS updated its surveillance methods by adding in calls to cell phones and changing its weighting methods. These changes improve BRFSS' ability to take into account the increasing proportion of U.S. adults using only cellular telephones. Because of these changes, the data from years prior to 2011 are not directly comparable to data from 2011 and later. Please see the [[a href="/nmibis-view/docs/Query/BRFSS/BRFSS_fact_sheet_Aug2012.pdf BRFSS Method Change Factsheet]]. Responses have been weighted to reflect the New Mexico adult population by age, sex, ethnicity, geographic region, marital status, education level, home ownership and type of phone. The "missing" and "don't know" responses are not included when calculating a percentage.

Health Topic Pages Related to: Obesity - Adult Prevalence

Community Health Resources and Links





Medical literature can be queried at the PubMed website.

Indicator Data Last Updated On 04/15/2021, Published on 04/29/2021
Nutrition, Obesity and Physical Activity Program, Population and Community Health Bureau, Public Health Division, New Mexico Department of Health, Public Health Division, 5301 Central Ave. NE, Suite 800, Albuquerque, NM 87108, Telephone: (505) 841-5840.