Body Mass Index (BMI) and the Metabolic Syndrome

Published by admin in Corporate Wellness on July 24th, 2012

For those of us who love statistics, this article will list some numbers and calculations related to BMI.

BMI is calculated by dividing your weight by your height in inches. For example a 160 lb person with a height of 70 inches has a BMI of 23. A 180 lb person with a height of 61 inches has a BMI of 34. The standards of the National Institutes of Health in 1998 advised that anyone with a BMI of 25 or above is overweight and anyone with a BMI of 30 or above is obese. In March 2005 researchers reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association that 56% of the players in the NFL are obese by these standards.

NFL players are a very select group of individuals. For the vast majority of the population, the standards for overweight and obesity can be used as a helpful guideline to watch for unwanted waistline expansion. Athletes in training and body builders will weigh more due to their muscle mass. Also remember the BMI chart doesn’t take bone mass, age or gender into account. Some health professionals refer to the circumference of your waist as an indicator of future health risks or measure body fat to determine the percentage of lean muscle mass to fat tissue in the body. These may be better guides as to a person’s exercise and nutritional habits. For men a waist size 40 inches or greater and for women 35 inches or greater is considered at risk for certain health problems.

The reason these statistics are currently in the news is due to the attention being given to the metabolic syndrome. This fairly new term is being applied to a group of risk factors that may lead to an increased chance of having diabetes, hypertension, and various types of heart disease. Poor nutrition, lack of exercise and a sedentary lifestyle leading to obesity, puts one at risk for some of these factors. Most charts of the metabolic syndrome identify several risks and indicate if one has three or more of them, the chances increase for the syndrome. The factors are: Blood pressure 130/85 or higher; HDL less than 40 mg (men) less that 50 mg (women); triglycerides 150 mg or higher: waist circumference 40 inches or higher (men), 35 inches or higher (women); and fasting glucose 110 mg or greater. Concerning our life style, there are additional risk factors over which we have no control such as age, gender, and family history of heart disease. We do have control over smoking, stress level, nutrition, exercise, rest and alcohol abuse.

At a recent conference on health and wellness, Dr. Neil Gordon, Clinical Professor of Medicine atEmoryUniversitymentioned that there is a way to treat the metabolic syndrome. The answer is TLC – Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes, which include weight management, exercise, dietary modification, and smoking cessation. TLC fights all the risk factors mentioned above. Another point mentioned by Dr. Gordon is that it is better to be slightly overweight and exercise than to be thin and inactive. Being thin does not mean you are healthy. An overweight person without a very large waist circumference, who exercises regularly, can be very healthy. Physical activity effectively targets waistline fat. Dr. Paul Ribisl, Chair in the Department of Health and Exercise Science,WakeForestUniversity, has written extensively on the value of using the waist circumference measurement as predictive of health outcomes for an individual. He believes

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this is a better measurement than the hip waist ratio or BMI alone.

You may have seen recent newspaper articles indicating that being slightly overweight was not necessarily a high risk factor for poor health or chronic disease. These articles were referring to what I mentioned above. The bottom line seems to be that just being thin does not indicate good health and being overweight alone does not indicate poor health. The two main ingredients that need to be added are physical activity and proper nutrition. If you would like further information on BMI or the Metabolic Syndrome, check with your doctor. Some statistics can be good for us to know. They are BMI, waist size, body fat, and scale weight. Armed with these numbers one can easily check progress monthly to determine a level of success toward a healthy lifestyle.

Article by Bob McDowell, Certified Personal Trainer.