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World J Clin Cases. May 26, 2026; 14(15): 118960
Published online May 26, 2026. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v14.i15.118960
Published online May 26, 2026. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v14.i15.118960
Burden and impact of metabolically healthy obesity on in-hospital outcomes of acute ischemic stroke: A nationwide study
Adil Sarvar Mohammed, Amaresh Gogikar, Department of Internal Medicine, Central Michigan University College of Medicine, Saginaw, MI 48602, United States
Rupak Desai, Independent Researcher, Outcomes Research, Atlanta, GA 30033, United States
Suvidha Manne, Department of Internal Medicine, St. Luke’s Hospital, Chesterfield, MO 63005, United States
Chenna Reddy Tera, Department of Internal Medicine, East Tennessee State University, Johnson, TN 37601, United States
Mrinal J P Oble, Department of Internal Medicine, State University of New York Downstate Health Sciences University, New York, NY 11203, United States
Amritha Nair, Department of Internal Medicine, Tbilisi State Medical University, Tbilisi 0186, Georgia
Shariq Nawab, Department of Internal Medicine, Dow University of Health Sciences, Karachi 74200, Sindh, Pakistan
Harshavardhan Polamarasetty, Department of Internal Medicine, Harlingen Medical Center, Harlingen, TX 78550, United States
Archit Ajay Srivastava, Department of Internal Medicine, Boston Medical Center-Brighton, Boston, MA 02135, United States
Swetha Chiluka, Department of Internal Medicine, Merit Health Wesley, Hattiesburg, MS 39402, United States
Akhil Kumar Eppalapally, Department of Internal Medicine, Mediciti Institute of Medical Sciences, Hyderabad 501401, Telangana, India
Satti Sethu K Reddy, Department of Endocrinology, Central Michigan University, Saginaw, MI 48602, United States
Co-first authors: Adil Sarvar Mohammed and Rupak Desai.
Author contributions: Mohammed AS and Desai R contributed equally to this work; Mohammed AS, Desai R and Gogikar A conceptualized the study; Mohammed AS, Desai R, Manne S, Gogikar A, Tera CR, Oble MJP, Nair A, Nawab S, Polamarasetty H, Srivastava AA, Chiluka S, Eppalapally AK, and Reddy SSK contributed to data interpretation and manuscript preparation; Mohammed AS and Desai R performed formal analysis; Gogikar A, Manne S, and Tera CR drafted the manuscript; Reddy SSK supervised the study; all authors critically revised the manuscript and approved the final version.
Institutional review board statement: Because this study used the National Inpatient Sample, a publicly available de-identified database, institutional review board approval was not required.
Informed consent statement: Informed consent was not required because this study used a publicly available de-identified database.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Corresponding author: Amaresh Gogikar, MD, Department of Internal Medicine, Central Michigan University College of Medicine, 1632 Stone Street, Saginaw, MI 48602, United States. gogikar.amaresh@gmail.com
Received: January 22, 2026
Revised: March 15, 2026
Accepted: April 7, 2026
Published online: May 26, 2026
Processing time: 116 Days and 14 Hours
Revised: March 15, 2026
Accepted: April 7, 2026
Published online: May 26, 2026
Processing time: 116 Days and 14 Hours
Core Tip
Core Tip: Metabolically healthy obesity (MHO) is increasingly recognized as a distinct obesity phenotype, but its implications in acute ischemic stroke (AIS) remain uncertain. In this nationwide propensity score-matched study using the 2020 National Inpatient Sample, MHO was not associated with worse short-term in-hospital outcomes or higher in-hospital mortality among patients hospitalized with AIS. These findings support a more phenotype-based interpretation of obesity-related risk in stroke, while also highlighting the need for further studies with more granular metabolic and longitudinal data to clarify long-term clinical implications.