Table 1.
Age-standardized characteristics in Nurses’ Health Study II at baseline in 1989
| Categories of weight change in 1991 from 1989a |
|||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Loss (>2 kg) (n = 14 510) | Stable (–2 to <2 kg) (n = 51 202) | Gain (2 to <10 kg) (n = 37 516) | Gain (10 to <20 kg) (n = 4558) | Gain (≥20 kg) (n = 719) | |
| Age (years)b | 34.5 (4.6) | 34.6 (4.6) | 34.5 (4.7) | 33.7 (4.7) | 34.1 (4.8) |
| Weight (kg) in 1989 | 72.7 (17.0) | 62.1 (12.9) | 66.0 (13.8) | 74.2 (16.7) | 80.4 (16.9) |
| Census tract median family income ($1000) | 42.5 (14.8) | 43.7 (15.5) | 42.5 (14.9) | 41.9 (14.5) | 40.4 (14.4) |
| Alternative Healthy Eating Index scorec | 47.3 (10.7) | 48.5 (11.15) | 48.9 (11.0) | 47.9 (10.7) | 47.2 (10.6) |
| Physical activity (MET-h/wk) | 22.5 (34.4) | 26.2 (38.8) | 24.3 (35.6) | 24.1 (32.9) | 28.5 (42.7) |
| Smoking status | |||||
| 0 pack years, % | 62.5 | 66.1 | 65.3 | 63.9 | 60.4 |
| 0–20 pack years, % | 30.7 | 28.8 | 28.9 | 29.6 | 30.9 |
| 20+ pack years, % | 6.8 | 5.1 | 5.8 | 6.5 | 8.7 |
| Parity and breastfeeding | |||||
| Nulliparous, % | 31.4 | 33.5 | 32.8 | 38.4 | 51.1 |
| Parous/breastfeeding 0 mo, % | 15.0 | 13.7 | 14.5 | 14.6 | 14.7 |
| Parous/breastfeeding ≤12 mo, % | 26.1 | 24.4 | 25.7 | 24.6 | 19.1 |
| Parous/breastfeeding >12 mo, % | 27.5 | 28.4 | 27.0 | 22.4 | 15.2 |
| Menopausal status and postmenopausal hormone use | |||||
| Premenopausal, % | 97.3 | 97.9 | 97.5 | 97.3 | 96.4 |
| Postmenopausal-never use, % | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.0 | 0.2 |
| ostmenopausal-current use, % | 2.3 | 1.9 | 2.2 | 2.4 | 3.1 |
| Postmenopausal-past use, % | 0.2 | 0.1 | 0.2 | 0.3 | 0.4 |
a
Weight change categories for this table defined using weight in 1991 (weight in 1989 subtracted from weight in 1991).
b
Value is not age adjusted.
c
The Alternative Healthy Eating Index score has a potential of range of 0 (no adherence and therefore poorest diet quality) to 110 (perfect adherence and therefore highest diet quality) points.
Values are means (standard deviation) or medians (Q25, Q75) for continuous variables; percentages or ns or both for categorical variables, and are standardized to the age distribution of the study population. Values of polytomous variables may not sum to 100% due to rounding.