No abstract

ELCSA (Encuesta Latinoamericana y del Caribe sobre Seguridad Alimentaria) has been validated and used in México for estimating Food Insecurity (FI). The objective of this study was to assess food insecurity in students from the Autonomous University of Queretaro, in México. A total of 662 students answered the ELCSA questionnaire, a food frequency questionnaire in addition, to a nutritional assessment based on weight, height, waist circumference, body composition and biochemical indexes including anemia, glucose, triglycerides and cholesterol. The 50.5% of students had some degree of FI, mainly emphasizing the mild (39.4 %). A higher prevalence of overweight and obesity were observed in students reporting severe‐FI than in those with mild and moderate FI. In contrast , the percentage of students with high body fat decreased with increasing severity of FI , even if the average value of % BF was not statistically different between IF‐students with mild and moderate (24.9 ±7.5 vs. 25.0±7.5, P > 0.05). Anemia affected 1.1% of students, being more prevalent the micro and macrocytic types in those students with FI. Severe FI‐students had the greatest number of cases with hypertriglyceridemia (33.3 %) and hypercholesterolemia (16.7%). According to the findings in this study, FI in Mexican college students could be an important factor related to the occurrence of overweight and obesity and its associated comorbidities among which include hypertriglyceridemia and hypercholesterolemia. Grant Funding Source: Supported by the Autonomus University of Queretaro