When you hear statistics like nearly 1 in 3 adults in the United States is overweight or that more than 2 in 5 adults have obesity, it’s important to understand that the measurement being used to come up with these conclusions is the body mass index, or BMI. More to the point, relying on BMI alone paints a very flawed picture of the true state of affairs when it comes to weight.
To shed some light, the team here at Lafferty Family Care, under the direction of Dr. Scott Lafferty, wants to take a brief dive into how we go beyond BMI to determine whether you might benefit from weight loss.
Since BMI is used to draw a number of conclusions about your health, you might think it’s a complex calculation. It is not. It’s a fairly simple calculation using your weight and height to determine how much body fat you have.
So, you simply enter your height and your weight (click here for a quick BMI calculation) and out comes a number that falls within these ranges:
People who measure 35 and higher have severe obesity.
Using your BMI to assess your health and wellness has a few flaws, especially if you're relying on this measurement alone.
The BMI technique was invented nearly 200 years ago by a mathematician in Belgium and it was primarily geared toward European (white) men. The calculation doesn’t account for gender or different body types in different ethnicities.
Nor does the BMI differentiate between muscle weight and weight from body fat. This means that an athlete with a good deal of muscle may weigh more and fall into the overweight or even obesity categories, even though that person has very little body fat.
In other words, you can have two people — both of whom are 5’10” and weigh 215 pounds — and one can be a lean athlete while the other may have more fat tissue. According to BMI alone, they’re both the same weight classification — obesity.
When we help our patients figure out whether they might be carrying too much body fat, we go far beyond the BMI. For example, a better measurement is that of your waist in relation to your height — your waist circumference should be less than half your height.
Carrying excess body fat in your abdomen is an area of concern, as it places you at higher risk for diabetes, liver disease, and heart disease.
Aside from waist circumference, we also take your genetics and health into consideration when we evaluate your weight.
Ultimately, we feel that a person’s ideal weight depends on a host of factors, and we like to plug all of these into the equation. Included in this is how you feel about your weight — do you feel like you're carrying excess pounds or are you happy with the way you move?
To get a much clearer picture of whether you might benefit from weight loss or whether your weight is within a healthy range for your circumstances, it’s a good idea to come in for a comprehensive assessment.
To get started, please contact our office in Bentonville, Arkansas, to set up an appointment.
