United States: There has been much criticism over the years about the use of body mass index, or BMI, as a wrong way of determining Obesity, and a group of experts has provided new guidelines.
More about the news
BMI is derived by comparing an individual’s weight to his or her height and can easily determine if one has a low BMI, normal BMI, high BMI, or Obesity BMI, although it has been found to be an imprecise predictor of body fat mass.
Doctors told to stop using only BMI to measure obesity due to overdiagnosis | @scoopit https://t.co/rSSWHcwcZP
— Enzo Calamo (@EnzoCalamo) January 15, 2025
More than 50 contributors to the report released Tuesday in the Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology journal suggest a different approach for physicians to classify obesity and screen patients.
About new recommendations
As much as the new recommendations still apply BMI as a screen for Obesity in a “first pass,” it goes deeper and asks whether one has pre-clinical Obesity or clinic obesity with other tools of measurement, according to Dr. Céline Gounder, who is the CBS News medical contributor and editor-at-large for public health at KFF Health News.
“So what that means is, do you actually have excess fat?” Gounder states that there are three main ways to measure this, according to CBS News.
🚨🌎 NEW PROPOSED DEFINITION OF OBESITY WOULD SIDELINE BODY MASS INDEX
— Verity (@improvethenews) January 15, 2025
Narrative A: The new definition provides a more nuanced and accurate approach to obesity diagnosis, moving away from the outdated BMI system to focus on actual health impacts. This change will help reduce… pic.twitter.com/3NY1aE52sG
1. Waist circumference, or a waist-to-hip ratio: “So if your waist is over 35 inches for a woman or 40 inches for a man, that means you do have excess fat, or are you apple-shaped versus pear-shaped?” Gounder said.
2. Directly measuring body fat: “Some older women might be familiar with a DEXA test to assess for bone thinning or osteoporosis. That can also be used to measure body fat,” Gounder said.
3. Effects on your daily living activities: “Can you climb up and down stairs? If you’re not able to because of your weight, that would be clinically obese,” she said. “Do you see damage to your organs, your kidneys, your heart, et cetera because of your Obesity? That would be clinical Obesity.”
What more are the experts stating?
New recommendations have been supported by 76 scientific societies and patients’ associations all over the world, the authors of the report pointed out, but it remains unclear how quickly and to what extent the amendments could be implemented.
As per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, BMI is an “inexpensive and easy screening method” that happens to be “strongly correlated” with weight-related medical conditions.
Move aside BMI: There's a better way to define obesity, a commission finds #fatass https://t.co/eBW4GDZPLk
— $mokecheddathaassgetta (@Latino69Heat69) January 15, 2025
However, BMI has attracted criticism in the recent past, with people condemning the identification method as not only inept but also as having prejudiced inclinations, specifically on gender and ethnicity.
“BMI is really looking at how much you weigh relative to your height. But not every, say, six-foot man who has the same weight is obese or healthy. Some of them may actually be strapping, muscular guys versus somebody who is truly overweight or obese. So we’re trying to distinguish between this,” as Gounder noted.
For instance, most professional players are clinically labeled as being obese even when, using the BMI scale, they are unable to differentiate between muscle mass and fat.