Abstract
Objectives The purpose of this study was to examine the characteristics of diagnostic pattern questionnaire associated with Body Mass Index in premenopausal women. Methods We studied 41 patients visiting Gangdong Kyung Hee University Hospital from 1st April 2011 to 25th May 2011. The subjects were categorized in two groups, overweight & obesity group (n=12) and low weight & normal group (n=29). We studied the difference of diagnostic pattern questionnaire scores between two groups by Independent samples T-test and correlation between diagnostic pattern questionnaire scores of overweight & obesity group by Pearson's correlation coefficient test using SPSS for windows (version 13.0). Results Blood stasis, retention of undigested food, cold pattern scores of overweight & obesity group were non-significantly higher than low weight & normal group. Heat pattern score of overweight & obesity group was significantly higher than low weight & normal group. Cold-heat, phlegm-cold, blood stasis-cold, phlegm-blood stasis, phlegm-retention of undigested food significantly showed positive correlation coefficient in overweight & obesity group. Conclusions The results suggest that obese women tend to show heat pattern. It seems to be that multiple factors such as phlegm, blood stasis, retention of undigested food are causative of obesity.