Abstract
Objective
To assess racial differences in body mass index (BMI) change over 5 years among people
with spinal cord injury (SCI).
Design
Multicenter longitudinal study.
Setting
Spinal Cord Injury Model Systems centers.
Participants
Individuals (N=437; 313 non-Hispanic white, 81 non-Hispanic black, and 43 Hispanic;
335 men; mean age, 41.3±13.5y) who incurred an SCI from 1974 to 2010 and completed
2 follow-up assessments within 5 years between October 1, 2006 and September 18, 2015
(mean duration of injury, 9.1±9.6y at the start of the 5-year follow-up).
Interventions
Not applicable.
Main Outcome Measures
BMI (in kilograms per meters squared).
Results
The mean BMI of 437 participants increased from 26.4±6.3 to 27.0±6.4kg/m2 over 5 years (P=.002). The greatest increase was noted for Hispanics (2.0±5.7kg/m2; P=.02), followed by non-Hispanic whites (0.6±3.9kg/m2; P=.01) and non-Hispanic blacks (0.01±3.7kg/m2; P>.99). The differences in BMI increase across racial groups were significant (P=.03) in those with paraplegia (American Spinal Injury Association Impairment Scale
A, B or C), those who were underweight or of normal weight at baseline, and those
within 10 years of their injury. Such racial differences remained significant after
taking into account demographic and injury characteristics.
Conclusions
Our study findings provide a foundation for future research to explore risk and protective
factors that contribute to racial differences in weight gain after SCI, which help
alert health care professionals to a high-risk group for obesity prevention and management.
Keywords
List of abbreviations:
AIS (American Spinal Injury Association Impairment Scale), BMI (body mass index), NSCID (National Spinal Cord Injury Database), SCI (spinal cord injury)To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: December 13, 2017
Footnotes
Supported by the National Institutes on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR; grant no. 90DP0083). NIDILRR is a center within the Administration for Community Living (ACL), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The contents of this article do not necessarily represent the policy of NIDILRR, ACL, HHS, and you should not assume endorsement by the Federal Government.
Disclosures: none.
Identification
Copyright
© 2017 by the American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine
