Association between breakfast omission and abdominal adiposity in low-income adolescents

Objective To assess the association between breakfast omission, overweight/obesity, abdominal adiposity, and unhealthy lifestyle of low-income adolescents. Methods A cross-sectional population study involving 571 public school students aged between 15 and 19 years old. The habit of having breakfast was assessed using a form, checking the weekly frequency of a given meal and considered as breakfast omission when these adolescents did not have breakfast for at least 5 days in the past week. Sociodemographic and lifestyle variables (sedentarism, physical activity level, and sleep duration) were also assessed. Overweight/obesity was defined as a body mass index above a Z-score of +1, and the presence of abdominal adiposity was determined by a waist circumference/height ratio greater than 0.5. The association between breakfast omission and lifestyle variables was assessed using the chi-square test and a multivariate logistic regression of the anthropometric indicators. Results The omission of breakfast was found in 31% of the adolescents and was associated with physical inactivity (p