Get advice from your midwife or GP if you're concerned about your weight. Page last reviewed: 15 July Next review due: 15 July Home Common health questions Lifestyle Back to Lifestyle. What is the body mass index BMI? If your BMI is: below Accuracy of BMI BMI takes into account natural variations in body shape, giving a healthy weight range for a particular height. Discover World-Changing Science. Body Mass Index BMI is a mathematical formula that divides a person's weight by the square of their height to arrive at a number that falls into one of these bodyweight categories: Beyond assigning one of these categories, a high BMI can be also an indicator of high body fat and therefore can be used to screen for certain weight levels that could lead to health problems.
A glob of muscle weighs about 18 percent more than the same size glob of fat. Should You Exercise While Sick? Get smart. Sign up for our email newsletter. Sign Up. Support science journalism. Knowledge awaits. See Subscription Options Already a subscriber?
Create Account See Subscription Options. Continue reading with a Scientific American subscription. Subscribe Now You may cancel at any time. Doctors calculate BMI for children and teens in the same way as they do for adults, by measuring height and weight. This will indicate whether the child is within a healthy range. First, click here for the calculator.
BMI is not accurate enough to use as a diagnostic tool, but it can screen for potential weight problems in adults and children. If someone has a high or low BMI, a doctor or other healthcare professional might then consider other factors, such as:.
The doctor or healthcare professional can then make diet and exercise recommendations based on these results. Carrying extra weight as a child or teenager can also pose significant health risks, both during childhood and into adulthood.
As with adult obesity, childhood obesity increases the risk of various health problems, including cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and sleep apnea. Apart from reducing the risk of the health conditions, maintaining a healthy weight offers additional benefits:.
For example, an athlete with a lot of muscle tissue may have a higher BMI than a person who is not very active. But, this does not mean that the athlete is overweight or unhealthy. In addition, cardiovascular disease and high blood pressure are more likely to occur in people who have additional fat — known as visceral fat — around their middle rather than their hips. Other measures of body size include waist-hip ratio, waist-to-height ratio, and body composition, which measures body fat and lean body mass.
These measurement systems focus more on the amount of fat a person has and its distribution around the body. BMI can be a useful screening tool for predicting certain health risks. However, people should use it with caution, as it does not take other factors — such as activity levels and body composition — into account. For children and teens, it is important to include their age and sex when taking a BMI measurement, because their bodies continuously change as they develop.
Find out more and use our tools to get a better idea of how much…. Obesity refers to when a person is carrying excess weight. It can put them at higher risk of a number of health conditions. Learn more here. Being a healthy weight offers many health benefits, as well as a feeling of wellbeing. Fast weight loss is rarely easy, but it is possible to lose….
Using body mass index BMI is one way to determine whether or not a person's weight is healthy for them.
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