Sagar Tewatia – Mumbai Uncensored, 11th May 2022
You must have heard the term BMI, and most people who follow a healthy lifestyle plan their diet based on BMI but is BMI a good indicator of health?
This article will help you know everything about BMI.
What is BMI?
The term “BMI” stands for “body mass index.” BMI was designed in 1832 by a mathematician called Lambert Adolphe Jacques Quetelet.
Quetelet developed the BMI scale to estimate the grade of overweight and obesity in a given population to help governments decide where the health and financial resources are needed.
Interestingly, He stated that BMI was not reasonable in studying single individuals but rather in giving an image of a population’s overall health. However, it’s widely used to calculate individuals’ health.
The BMI scale is based on a formula that determines whether an individual is of a “fit” weight by splitting their weight in kilograms by their height in meters squared:
- BMI = weight (kg) / height (m2)
- Alternatively, you can also calculate BMI by using online calculators.
BMI scale helps you in determining whether you fall within the “normal” weight range or not.
As per the BMI calculation, healthcare professionals may suggest health and lifestyle modifications if you don’t fall within the “normal” weight class.
We would like you to consider that BMI can give the healthcare expert an image of an individual’s health based on a person’s weight. Still, it doesn’t consider additional factors, such as age, genetics, sex, fat mass, muscle mass, and bone density.
Is BMI a good indicator of health?
Despite the crisis that BMI doesn’t accurately determine whether a person is fit or not, most examinations show that an individual’s risk of chronic sickness and early death does increase with a BMI lower than 18.5 (“underweight”) or of 30.0 or greater (“obese”).
For example, a 2017 retrospective study of 103,218 deaths encountered that the people who owned a BMI of 30.0 or greater (“obese”) had a 1.5–2.7 times more splendid risk of death after a 30-year follow-up.
Another study on 16,868 people showed that those in the “obese” BMI category had a 20% raised risk of death from all causes and heart disease compared with those in the “normal” BMI category.
The investigators also encountered that those who were in the “underweight” class and the “harshly obese” or “excessively obese” classes died an average of 6.7 years and 3.7 years earlier, respectively, than those in the “normal” BMI category.
Other analyses have revealed that a BMI greater than 30.0 seriously raises the risk of chronic health issues such as type 2 diabetes, gut disease, respiring difficulties, kidney disease, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, and mobility problems.
Similarly, a 5–10% reduction in a person’s BMI has reduced rates of metabolic syndrome, gut disease, and type 2 diabetes.
Due to most analyses showing a risen chronic disease risk among individuals with obesity, many fitness professionals can use BMI as a general picture of an individual’s risk. Still, it should not be the only diagnostic instrument used.
Takeaway
Body mass index (BMI) is a controversial health inspection tool developed to evaluate an individual’s body fat and risk of poor health.
Though BMI can be helpful as a starting point, it should not be the only measurement of your fitness.
