Prevalence and geographic variation of abdominal obesity in 7- and 9-year-old children in Greece; World Health Organization Childhood Obesity Surveillance Initiative 2010.

Background: In children, abdominal obesity is a better predictor of the presence of cardiovascular risk factors than body mass index (BMI)-defined obesity. We aimed to evaluate the prevalence of abdominal obesity in the Greek pediatric population and to assess the impact of residence on the prevalence of both BMI-defined and abdominal obesity.

Methods: In the context of the Childhood Obesity Surveillance Initiative of the World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Europe, a national representative sample of 7.