Body weight and physical fitness in women with ischaemic heart disease: does physical fitness contribute to our understanding of the obesity paradox in women?

To address the paradox of body weight and outcomes in women, we report for the first time that among women with signs/symptoms of IHD overweight-fit and obese-fit were at lower risk of long-term all-cause mortality; whereas normal BMI-unfit were at higher risk of MACE. Physical fitness may contribute to the obesity paradox in women, warranting future studies to better understand associations between body weight, body composition, and physical fitness to improve cardiovascular outcomes in women.