Is Obese BMI Accurate? Or Body Shape Counts?
As someone who teaches both doctors and the public about obesity, for me I would think that weight loss has been overemphasized and body shape under emphasized. How many teaches us how to get back our body shape? And how many people are more concern about their body size or shape? Or in their mind, losing weight = slim. No way, someone could lose weight up to 10lbs, but nothing change to their shape. Just from the weighing scale, it is showing the difference.
You have probably read about the Body Mass Index (BMI), which is a weight-to-height ratio. If your BMI is greater than 25, you are considered overweight in the U.S., and if it is greater than 30 you are obese. This ratio has been a powerful way for scientists to document the obesity epidemic in this country and its effects on health and disease. However, when it comes to you as an individual, it can be misleading.
An athlete can be considered overweight on the BMI scale, but if the extra weight being carried is muscle, he is not really fat. A thin woman can have a normal BMI, yet still be over-fat. So shape counts.
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