- Body mass index (BMI) has lengthy been used as a device for weight administration and intervention, however consultants say it has many flaws.
- They say waist-to-hip ratio could also be a extra correct indicator of danger of mortality from all causes.
- They add that waist-to-hip ratio could also be a extra useful gizmo in healthcare interventions.
Waist-to-hip ratio could also be a greater device for figuring out weight administration than physique mass index (BMI), in accordance with a brand new
Research printed this week within the journal JAMA Network Open reviews that waist-to-hip ratio could also be extra helpful than BMI in figuring out well being dangers and medical interventions.
For their research, the researchers examined information from 387,672 contributors based mostly within the United Kingdom. They in contrast information on BMI, fats mass index, and waist-to-hip ratio.
“Compared with BMI, [waist-to-hip ratio] had the strongest, most robust, and consistent association with all-cause mortality and was the only measurement unaffected by BMI. Current WHO recommendations for optimal BMI range are inaccurate across individuals with various body compositions and therefore suboptimal for clinical guidelines,” the researchers wrote.
“Future research is needed to explore whether using WHR as the primary clinical measure of adiposity (body fat) would help to improve long-term health outcomes in distinct patient populations compared with BMI. Our results provide further support to shift public health focus from measures of general adiposity, such as BMI, to adiposity distribution using [waist-to-hip ratio],” the research authors added.
Waist-to-hip ratio is the circumference of the waist divided by the circumference of the hip.
In each women and men, a waist-to-hip ratio of 1.0 or above is taken into account in danger for circumstances equivalent to coronary heart illness.
Those who carry extreme fats round their midsection could also be at
Experts say BMI is usually a problematic device.
“BMI historically has been ‘the’ tool used in weight management in doctor’s offices, hospitals, etc. Even to this day it is still used. That’s because it is extremely easy to calculate. All you need is height and weight. However, BMI is fraught with problems, one of them is that you can have a weight lifter with 8% body fat with a BMI of 35 and you can have someone who has 35% body fat with the same BMI. It’s nonspecific,” mentioned Dana Hunnes, PhD, a senior medical dietitian on the UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles who was not concerned within the new research.
“Waist-to-hip ratio does do a better job of capturing visceral fat, mid-body fat, waist fat, the fat that is most harmful in terms of all-cause and cause-specific mortality,” Hunnes advised Medical News Today. “So yes, given that this is a better measure, surrogate for adiposity in general and adiposity distribution, I do think that we should be using it more often.”
Despite the issues of the BMI, consultants observe it’s nonetheless a generally used device.
“It has a very significant amount of flaws in it… but it is a useful tool,” mentioned Dr. Dan Azagury, the part chief of Minimally Invasive and Bariatric Surgery at Stanford University in California who was not concerned within the research.
“It’s still a useful tool for multiple reasons,” he advised Medical News Today. “One is, it is pretty deeply ingrained in a lot of the things that we use… The guidelines from the [Food and Drug Administration] and the [National Institutes of Health] around management of obesity are still around BMI.”
“What your insurance will pay, what treatment they will pay for is based on BMI,” Azagury added. “So while I agree that it’s flawed, it’s here and it’s so widely used that we’re probably going to have to live with it for a lot longer.”
According to the
This consists of loss of life from all causes, hypertension, stroke, psychological sickness, sleep apnea, gallbladder illness, osteoarthritis, respiratory issues, low high quality of life, hassle with bodily functioning, and sort 2 diabetes.
“The higher our adiposity (the more fat we have in our bodies, and specifically, the more visceral/mid-body fat we have), the greater is our risk of dying from any cause and from cause-specific (cardiovascular disease, cancer). The higher our body fat, the more likely it is we will die sooner,” Hunnes mentioned.
“Due to the associations/relationships between all-cause and cause-specific mortality and adiposity, it’s important to have a reliable surrogate measure of adiposity. This is used as an independent predictor of all-cause and cause-specific mortality,” she added.
In the United States, practically
In 2019 {dollars}, the CDC estimated that the annual cost associated to weight problems is
Azagury argues that whereas having a dependable device with which to measure and handle weight is essential, that is solely a part of the puzzle in serving to those that are obese or have weight problems.
“The challenge still is that the vast majority of patients do not come and seek medical help to tackle their obesity. And when they do, they’re still faced many times by stigma from their provider,” he mentioned.
“Right now, we don’t even have an opportunity to treat most of the people that actually would benefit from treatment. What we need to tackle is the stigma around obesity, and that it is a disease that needs to be treated, and that patients who have obesity should not be ostracized,” Azagury added.
