Objective:

Identify the impact of lifestyle on the nutritional status of Mexican women.

Methodology:

To measure lifestyle, the questionnaire called FANTASTIC was applied to a sample of 390 women assigned to the Unidad de Medicina Familiar (UMF) of the Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social located in Ciudad Madero, Tamaulipas. And a multiple regression analysis was developed to study the impact of variables such as age, level of studies, family hereditary background, as well as the estimated lifestyle measure on nutritional status, the latter approximated by the body mass index (BMI).

Results:

There is a statistically significant relationship between lifestyle and nutritional status, where women, who claim to have a healthy lifestyle, have a BMI 12.86 % lower, compared to those who do not practice it. In addition, the numbers found indicate that 38.5 % of women are overweight and 34.1 % in some degree of obesity.

Limitations:

The application is made only within the UMF, so the findings only apply to the population of women in the institute.

Conclusions:

It is necessary to reinforce the message about maintaining a healthy lifestyle by all the medical personnel that make up the department of first contact and social communication, to prevent increases in obesity levels.

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