Obesities · Published 2026-06-06 · DOI 10.3390/obesities6030040
Luiza Dias Machado, Larissa da Silva Souza Cordeiro, Caroline de Barros Gomes, Edison Iglesias de Oliveira Vidal, Gislane Lelis Vilela de Oliveira
Obesity is an adiposity-based low-grade chronic inflammatory disease characterized by excessive fat accumulation and/or dysregulated adipose function, affecting health, quality of life, and mortality. Despite the implementation of public health strategies and individualized therapeutic interventions, obesity currently affects more than one billion people worldwide. Although the distinction between preclinical obesity (PCO) and clinical obesity (CO) has recently been conceptually established, practical tools capable of translating this distinction into clinical diagnosis are still lacking. In this study, we proposed a novel diagnostic framework in which the SF-36 Role-Physical (RP) domain functions as a screening tool to identify physical limitations associated with CO. The framework integrates anthropometric criteria (body mass index and waist circumference), organ dysfunction (presence of comorbidities), and objectively defined physical limitations based on RP domain cutoff values. To validate the framework, patients’ inflammatory profiles were evaluated. Our results demonstrated that stratification based on this functional model could identify a phenotype characterized by a distinct pro-inflammatory profile. CO patients exhibited significantly increased IL-6 and IL-17A levels compared with the PCO and overweight groups. Taken together, these findings suggest that this approach may serve as a simple, low-cost, and clinically applicable strategy to support differentiation between preclinical and clinical obesity. However, larger longitudinal and multicenter studies are needed to validate these findings.
Abstract from DOAJ. Public domain (CC0 1.0).
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Machado, L., Cordeiro, L., Gomes, C., et al. (2026). A Novel Diagnostic Application of the SF-36 Role-Physical Domain for Identifying Clinical Obesity. Obesities. https://doi.org/10.3390/obesities6030040