Measuring body fat, rather than body mass index, appears to more accurately identify people who need lifestyle interventions to lose weight, study findings suggest. Excess body fat is a risk factor for many major health problems such as heart disease and diabetes, researchers note in the Nutrition Journal.
When evaluating individuals for lifestyle recommendations to minimise such health risks, body mass index (BMI) under identifies risk, said Dr Ottavia Colombo of the University of Pavia in Italy. "The use of BMI alone does not discriminate between fat mass and fat-free mass, nor reflect the fat mass distribution,"Colombo said. Colombo and colleagues recruited 23 men and 40 women, aged 20 to 65 years, to undergo body composition analysis in the Human Nutrition and Eating Disorders Research Centre at the university.
The volunteers were healthy, but led sedentary lives and were not following a low-calorie diet. The researchers obtained each person's BMI as well as body-fat measurements including waist circumference and total percent body fat.
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