New Research Indicates A Massive Underdiagnosis Of Obesity When Using Body Mass Index (BMI)

What is most important here is that we are fatter than we think.

A retrospective analysis of 1,234 Americans indicated a substantial underdiagnosis of obesity when Body Mass Index (BMI) was used compared to the Dual Engergy X-ray Absorptiometry (DEXA) scan. This analysis will be released on Friday, April 23, 2010 at the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists (AACE) 19th Annual Meeting & Clinical Congress in Boston.

To date, no large-scale comparison has been made between BMI and DEXA, a direct measure of percentage body fat. A team of physicians and scientists from PATH Foundation NY reviewed the medical records of 1,234 patients from 2003 to 2009 to obtain BMI (from height and weight) and percentage body fat (from Hologic DEXA). Subjects were classified as obese or non-obese based on the American Bariatric Society's classification of obesity, which is a BMI of 30 or higher or a percent body fat of 25 or higher in males and percent body fat of 30 or higher in females.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) traditionally consider an adult with a BMI between 25 and 29.9 as overweight while an adult with a BMI of 30 or higher is considered obese.

"Extrapolating our data on a global scale, it is very likely that obesity is a much bigger epidemic than the 300 million people acknowledged by the World Health Organization (WHO)," Eric Braverman, MD, a primary author of the study said.

BMI remains the best tool we have for determining overweight/obesity since, among other benefits, it is available to everybody.

Apparently, if it has a fault, it is not inaccuracy leading to over-diagnosis. It is under-diagnosing.

By pooh-poohing BMI, the researchers are promoting another way to generate moolah for the sick care industry by making what is available to all of us seem bad.