Hugo Azcorra

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Researcher at Universidad Modelo

INTRODUCCIÓN: Las anormalidades nutricionales durante la infancia, por carencias o excesos, son un problema de salud pública global por lo que es necesario conocer la situación de Yucatán dada su heterogeneidad socioeconómica. OBJETIVO: Caracterizar la presencia de talla baja para la edad (TB) y exceso de peso (EP: sobrepeso/obesidad) en escolares...

Objective To analyze the changes in children's height, weight, BMI and rates of stunting and overweight and obesity over three periods: 1986–1987, 1996–1998, and 2023 for the community of Yalcoba in the Yucatan Peninsula. Material and Methods Four hundred forty (6‐to‐15 years) children measured in 2023 were compared with data obtained in 1986–1987...

Background Knowledge about the influence of early developmental factors on cardiometabolic health in the Maya is limited. Aim To analyse the relationship between birthweight (BW) and cardiometabolic parameters in a sample of rural Maya children from Yucatan, Mexico. Subjects and methods We took anthropometric measurements and obtained data on BW...

Traveling with the intention of encountering art or seeking purification of the spirit involves retribution of intangible nature and therefore can be expected to be a positive experience; nevertheless, among susceptible travelers, there is also a possibility of experiencing pathological conditions. Although it is colloquially known that beauty lies...

We aimed to analyze the association between the average lumbar subcutaneous fat tissue thickness (LSFTT) at each intervertebral level and the presence of hernias in patients with low back pain from an insurance network hospital in Mexico. This observational prospective study included 174 patients with non-traumatic lumbago who underwent magnetic re...

Background: Over the years, there has been a noticeable increase in the incidence of multiple pregnancies, due in part to the increased use of assisted reproductive technologies in recent years. The increase in twin pregnancies constitutes a public health challenge due to the adverse outcomes sometimes they entail. Twin pregnancies inherently carry...

Introducción. Conocer los patrones sociodemográficos de las personas fallecidas por suicidio contribuye a la comprensión del fenómeno y al planteamiento de medidas preventivas efectivas. Objetivo. Describir cuantitativamente la tendencia de los suicidios ocurridos en Yucatán durante 2012-2021 y analizar las diferencias en los perfiles sociodemográf...

Objectives Retroperitoneal tumor resection commonly disturbs major vessels; therefore, surgical teams can recruit vascular surgeons to prevent injuries and improve the prognosis of oncologic patients. The objective of the present study is to establish long-term survival after retroperitoneal tumor resection surgery with an emphasis on the potential...

Objective: To analyze changes in height, weight, and body mass index (BMI = kg/m2 ) from 1986 to 2022 in 3-11 year old children from Dzeal, a rural Maya community in Yucatan, Mexico. Materials and methods: From October-2022 to February-2023 (third-wave survey), we obtained anthropometric measurements of children (n = 80) and family socioeconomic...

Diabetes and obesity are diseases of relevance in the epidemiological context of Yucatan. The high coexistence and complex interaction between these pathologies have generated an initial characterization of the phenomenon called diabesity, however, it is necessary to resort to comprehensive theoretical frameworks that contribute to the understandin...

Objective: To analyze the impact of COVID-19 on the number of births in Yucatan, Mexico during 2020 and 2021. Material and methods: A total of 470 651 live births occurred in Yucatan from January 1st, 2008, to December 31st, 2021, and were included in the analysis. The monthly number of births observed during January 2008-February 2020 was used...

Objetivo: Describir la diversidad dietética (DD) de un grupo de mujeres embarazadas del municipio de Mérida, Yucatán. Métodos: Se aplicó un cuestionario socioeconómico y tres recordatorios de 24 horas (R-24) en días no consecutivos a 83 mujeres embarazadas. La DD se evaluó a nivel individual de acuerdo a la puntuación Mínima de Diversidad Dietétic...

In this observational study, our aim was to analyse the association between pre-pregnancy BMI and adequacy rates of energy and macronutrient intakes in a sample of pregnant women from Yucatan, Mexico. From September to December 2019, we collected data on socioeconomic, pregnancy, and dietary characteristics, and took anthropometric measurements of...

In this chapter is a review, from a human ecology perspective, of what we know about the adult size of populations in the Yucatan Peninsula from the Preclassic to the present, including the different periods of the Maya civilization, the Colonial period and the two centuries of independent Mexico. Our sources of information will be, in addition to...

No aplica al ser un Editorial

Background: Fetal growth restriction (FGR) may be related to ethnicity. Additionally, ethnic groups experience adverse socioeconomic circumstances that increase FGR risk. However, the dearth of evidence of the interaction between socioeconomic factors and FGR highlights the need for additional research. Objective: To analyze the association betw...

Early‐life conditions shape childhood growth and are affected by urbanization and the nutritional transition. To investigate how early‐life conditions (across the “first” and “second” 1000 days) are associated with rural and urban children's nutritional status, we analyzed anthropometric data from Maya children in Yucatan, Mexico. We collected weig...

Objective: To develop sex- and gestational age specific reference percentiles and curves for birth weight and length for Yucatec neonates using data from birth registers of infants born during 2015-2019. Material and methods: Observational, descriptive, epidemiologic study in a 5-year period including every registered birth in the state of Yucat...

Background Socioeconomic factors influence diet quality during pregnancy. However, dearth of evidence about the influence on energy and macronutrients adequacy calls for research. Objective To analyze the association between socioeconomic factors and adequacy rates of energy and macronutrients intakes in pregnant women from Merida, Yucatan, Mexico...

Objectives: To provide an insight of the incidence of congenital developmental dysplasia of the hip in newborns from Yucatan born between 2015 and 2019 and analyze its association with maternal sociodemographic characteristics and neonatal, pregnancy and delivery related aspects. Methods: Retrospective, population-based study from Birth Registri...

Developmental dysplasia of the hip in Yucatan Mexico dataset

This study analyzes the influence of grandmothers’ household residency on the presence of low height-for-age and excessive fat (FMI = fat mass [kg]/height [m2]), waist circumference, and sum of triceps and subscapular skinfolds in a sample of 247 6- to 8-year-old urban Maya children from Yucatan, Mexico. Between September 2011 and January 2014, we...

Birth weight discordance (BWD) is not an uncommon event in twin pregnancies and can be associated with maternal and newborns' characteristics. We aimed to analyse the association between maternal sociodemographic and newborn characteristics with BWD in twin infants born in Yucatan, Mexico, during 2008-2017 (n = 2091 pairs). BWD was calculated as th...

In 2020, while living through unprecedented health outcomes from the COVID-19 epidemic in Mexico, a human ecology perspective provides us with an unconventional way to analyze the role of the mediate effects of Mexican nutritional impacts and their prevalence in COVID-19-related mortality. According to official data, by the end of September 2020, m...

Objective To analyze the association between newborn and maternal characteristics and the risk for cesarean section (CS) due to cephalopelvic disproportion (CPD) and non‐CPD causes compared to vaginal deliveries (VD) in a sample of infants and mothers from Merida, Yucatan, Mexico. Methods The final sample consisted of 3453 single, live, and term i...

Objective To test the hypothesis that fetal growth, indexed by birth weight (BW), induce metabolic adjustments in the fetus that will be reflected in differences in body composition in a sample of 6‐to 8‐years old urban Maya children from Yucatan, Mexico. Methods We measured height (cm), weight (kg) and triceps skinfold (mm) in 260 children (boys:...

Background: Birth measures of twins are potentially influenced by sex of co-twin. Aim: To analyse the association between sex of co-twin and birth weight, length and ponderal index in twin infants from Yucatan, Mexico. Subjects and methods: A total of 2057 twin pairs born during 2008–2017 were analysed. Female-female (F-F), male-male (M-M) and male...

Objectives: To analyze the relationship of birth weight, birth order, breastfeeding duration, and age of introduction of solid foods with height, fat mass, and fat-free mass in a sample of Maya children when aged 6 to 8 years old. Methods: We collected data on anthropometry, body composition, children's birth weight, birth order, early feeding p...

Globalization is an economic force to bring about a closer integration of national economies. Globalization also has effects on human biology. Food globalization brings about Nutritional transition, the most common being a shift from a locally grown diet with minimally refined foods, to the modern diet of highly processed foods, high in saturated F...

This book adopts a human ecology approach to present an overview of the biological responses to social, political, economic, cultural and environmental changes that affected human populations in the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico, since the Classic Maya Period. Human bodies express social relations, and we can read these relations by analyzing biologica...

We critically analyze definitions of Growth stunting and low height-for-age, Height-for-age on the arbitrary cut-off points that classify people dichotomously as “Stunted” or “non-stunted.” We discuss how individuals may be included or excluded in one of such categories, depending on the Standard or references used, and list inherent Health implica...

Today a considerable proportion of Yucatecan Maya reside in urban areas, with the city of Merida being a site with a long history of settlement. The Maya bring with them a historical legacy of poverty and abusive treatment during the more than 500 years of European and then Mestizo domination. This chapter discusses, from a human ecology perspectiv...

Background: Overweight/obesity (OW/OB) coexists in mother-child dyads. However, a dearth of evidence on the factors associated with this phenomenon calls for research. Objective: To analyze the association of sociodemographic factors with OW/OB in a sample of 260 Maya mother-child dyads from Yucatan, Mexico. Methods: During 2011 to 2014, we me...

Objective: The aim of this study was to analyze the association between relative leg length (RLL) (leg length × 100/height) and adiposity in a sample of 6- to 8-year-old children of Maya ancestry from Motul and Merida, Mexico. Methods: This cross-sectional study included 260 children (128 girls) measured between 2011 and 2015. The RLL was used a...

Objectives The purpose of this study was to analyze the association between birth mode and fat mass index (FMI = fat mass [kg]/height [m]²), and z‐score values of waist circumference (WCZ) and sum of triceps and subscapular skinfolds (SumSkfZ) in a sample of 256 6‐ to 8‐year‐old urban Maya children from the cities of Merida and Motul in Yucatan, Me...

OBJECTIVE. To describe the annual bimonthly distribution of cases of maternal mortality at the national and Yucatan state levels. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Retrospective cross-sectional study, which included all direct maternal mortality registries with ICD-10 letter “O” registered in the open access databases of the Mexican Ministry of Health, betwe...

Background: Some studies have found a negative relationship between obesity and school performance in scholars. However, this topic has not been studied in depth in Mexico. This study aimed to analyze the association between overweight and obesity with school performance in secondary school students in Merida. Methods: Weight and height were measur...

Human nutritional ecology encompasses the biocultural relationships between people and their food. From a biological perspective, food is central to life because of the essential nutrients it provides, which are needed for growth, repair, and maintenance of the body. From a medical perspective, food is central because of the consequences of diet an...

Objectives To analyze the influence of maternal height (MH) on offspring's birth weight (BW) in infants born from January 2016 to May 2017, in Merida, Mexico. Methods A total of 3462 singletons born at term in a public hospital were analyzed. Data extracted from hospital records were MH; number of previous births; and infant's sex, BW, and gestati...

Comunicamos resultados centrales de un proyecto multidisciplinario que abordó la corporeidad humana como un producto social, histórico, inmerso en un campo de ejercicio del poder. Nuestros estudios de grupos mayas en Mérida, Yucatán, realizados en los últimos quince años, evidencian las consecuencias a largo plazo de las condiciones de vida en que...

Introducción: Diversos estudios señalan una relación negativa entre la obesidad y el rendimiento académico en la población infantil. Sin embargo, este tema ha sido poco estudiado en México. El objetivo de este estudio fue analizar la asociación entre el sobrepeso y la obesidad con el rendimiento académico en estudiantes de secundaria de Mérida. Mét...

Background: Some studies have found a negative relationship between obesity and school performance in scholars. However, this topic has not been studied in depth in Mexico. The aim of this study was to analyze the association between overweight and obesity with school performance in secondary school students from Merida. Methods: Weight and heig...

Objectives: To analyze whether living conditions, experienced by mothers and adult daughters during their childhood, are associated with age at menarche (AAM) in daughters. Methods: From September, 2011, to January, 2014, AAM and childhood living conditions were collected from a sample of 246 dyads of Maya mothers (mean age = 59.60 years, SD = 8...

Análisis de la estacionalidad de la mortalidad materna a nivel estatal y en el estado de Yucatán, estudio retrospectivo longitudinal a 10 años

The number of studies on birth seasonality in Mexico is very limited and most have focused on the association be-tween seasonal variation in the frequency of births and agri-cultural cycles in local populations. In this study, wedescribe the pattern of birth seasonality in Yucatan be-tween 2008 and 2015 to test our hypothesis that birthrhythmicity...

En nuestro estudio llevado a cabo en la ciudad de Mérida, el 22,7% de los niños se ubicó entre el percentil 85 y 94,9 (sobrepeso) y 22,2% por encima del percentil 95 (obesidad), de acuerdo a los criterios de la CDC, y aquellos en quienes se detectaron alteraciones cardiometabólicas fueron cuyo percentil se encontraba ≥ 97, lo cual sugiere que la pr...

Objective: To analyze the relationship between maternal height, offspring birth weight, and adiposity at 6-10 years of age in a sample of 197 mother-child dyads from Merida, Mexico. Materials and methods: During 2008-2009 and 2011-2013, measurements were taken of maternal height and weight; and height, waist circumference (WC), and skinfolds (tr...

In Mexico, the nutritional status of school age children it is still a public health problem, particularly in the country southeast where malnutrition is alarming. Yucatan state, in Mexico, has one of the highest chronic undernutrition (stunting) and overweight/obesity prevalences. The aim of this study was to describe the growth and nutritional st...

En México, el estado nutricional de niños en edad escolar aun es un problema de salud pública, particularmente en el sureste del país en donde las cifras de mala nutrición son alarmantes. El estado de Yucatán, México, presenta una de las prevalencias más altas de desnutrición crónica (talla baja) y sobrepeso/obesidad en la región. El objetivo de es...

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to analyze the association between maternal Maya ancestry and the birth weight of infants born in Yucatan, Mexico, during 2013. Methods: A total of 30,435 singletons born at term (�37 weeks) in Yucatan during 2013 were analyzed. Birth weights, gestational ages, and maternal socioeconomic data were provided...

Poster presented at the 2015 AAPA (American Association of Physical Anthropologists) meetings, St Louis, MO, USA (April 2015)

To analyze differences in knee height (KH) between adult Maya mothers and daughters in Merida City, Mexico, and determine if these differences are associated with their childhood socioeconomic conditions. From September 2011 to January 2014, we measured KH and collected data on childhood conditions (place of birth, type of drinking water, family si...

The Maya Project (mayaproject.org.uk) The Maya are the largest living group of Native Americans, with 6-7 million members dispersed across what is now Guatemala, Mexico, and Belize. During 2012, popular interest in the Maya increased largely as the result of a prophecy, falsely interpreted, claiming that cataclysmic events would occur as a conseque...

Objectives To test the hypothesis that living conditions experienced by maternal grandmothers (F1 generation) and mothers (F2 generation) during their childhood are related to height and leg length (LL: height − sitting height) of their 6-to-8 year old children (F3 generation).Methods From September 2011 to June 2012 we obtained height and LL, and...

A cross-sectional study was done in 2006-2007 of 458 children (218 boys and 240 girls) aged 4 to 6 years (range 4.00 to 6.99 years) in Merida, Mexico. Height (cm) and body weight (kg) were measured to estimate growth; body mass index (BMI, kg/m2) was calculated to evaluate nutritional status. Results showed significant sex difference with respect t...

Globalization is, in part, an economic force to bring about a closer integration of national economies. Globalization is also a biological, social and ideological process of change. Globalization results in powerful multinational corporations imposing their products on new markets. Food globalization brings about nutritional transitions, the most c...

To test the hypothesis that leg length-relative-to-stature is a more sensitive indicator of nutrition and health than is total height (HT) or sitting height (SH) in a sample of 109 triads of urban Maya children (6.0-8.99 years), their mothers, and maternal grandmothers from Merida, Mexico. From September 2011 to June 2012, the following factors wer...

Identify the biological, social, and economic conditions influencing the knee height/stature index (KHSI) in growing individuals of Maya ancestry in the city of Merida, Yucatan, Mexico. The hypothesis was that KHSI values would be lower in subjects with two Maya surnames. This was tested by analyzing the effect of a series of environmental, biologi...

The Maya are the most populous and shortest in stature Native American ethnic group. The Maya provide us a good opportunity to study the dietetic characteristics of a group who experience nutritional dual burden (the combination of under and ovenutrition) at the individual, mother-child dyad and population level. The aim of this study is to describ...

Podium presentation. 38 Annual Meeting - Human Biology Association, Knoxville, TN (April 2013).

Summary Variation in height among young adults has been linked to the living conditions of different social groups. The aim of this study was to measure variation in the height and knee height of young adults by head of household employment level and family income. The sample comprised 180 individuals (90 girls) aged 16 and 17 years living in the c...

This paper focuses on the phenomenon of the nutritional dual-burden in the developing world. Nutritional dual-burden is defined as the coexistence of under-and-over nutrition in the same population/group, the same household/family, or the same person. In this paper we aim: a) to describe the different types of nutritional dual-burden, b) to identif...

Background: Chronic early life under-nutrition (stunting) has been associated with an increased risk of overweight in adulthood, perhaps due to reduced energy expenditure. Aim: To determine whether the association between stunting and body size and composition is related to objectively measured energy expenditure (EE). Subjects and Methods: Height...

Body mass index (BMI) is used frequently to estimate adiposity levels in children and adults. However, the applicability of BMI to populations with high levels of stunting has been questioned. Stunted people can have disproportionately short legs, which may increase BMI without increasing body fat because of the relatively larger trunk compared wit...

To understand age-sex variation of stature and upper arm length (UAL) and to estimate stature from UAL through prediction equations. A cross-sectional study was undertaken in 2006-2007 among 458 children (218 boys and 240 girls) aged 4.0 to 6.92 y of south Merida in Yucatan, Mexico. The results show significant age variation (p < 0.001) of stature...

Introduction and aims: Developing countries are currently facing a dual burden of chronic malnutrition and overweight/obesity. The biocultural determinants of this phenomenon are rooted in the combined effects of socioeconomic change, metabolic impairments, intergenerational effects and negative early-life outcomes. Energy expenditure levels also p...

Introduction: Obesity levels are rapidly increasing worldwide, including developing countries undergoing nutrition and behavioural transition, thereby raising the risk of related chronic diseases. In such contexts, intergenerational influences may account for some of this increase through metabolic pathways and fat utilisation and storage. This stu...

Introduction: Obesity levels are rapidly increasing worldwide, including developing countries undergoing nutrition and behavioural transition. In such contexts, intergenerational influences may account for some of this increase through multi-generational influences on growth. This study aims to determine whether mother’s childhood socioeconomic sta...

In this contribution we make a literature review on child and adolescenl growth status and development in Yucatán and use data from our own rescarch to summarize the available knowledge on this topic. Our results show that despite the fact that the data available to date is sparse and incomplete, the panorama of human growth in Yucatan is discourag...

In developing nations, obesity has increased dramatically in the last decade, but a high prevalence of stunting still coexists. The intergenerational influences hypothesis (IIH) is one explanation for this. We test the IIH regarding variation in maternal stature, mother's age at pregnancy, and infant birth weight in relation to risk for overweight...

Merida city in Yucatan, Mexico, has received rural-to-urban migration for decades, with most immigrants settling in the city's southern neighborhoods. Exposure of immigrants to new environmental and sociocultural conditions can generate biological responses, including changes in physical growth pattern at early age. We performed a study to identify...

In developing nations, obesity has increased dramatically in the last decade, but a high prevalence of stunting still coexists. The intergenerational influences hypothesis (IIH) is one explanation for this. We test the IIH regarding variation in maternal stature, mother's age at pregnancy, and infant birth weight in relation to risk for overweight...