Do you need to lose fat? How do you know if you do? Are you
at a healthy weight? How do you know?
For a long time we’ve been using charts like the BMI. The
limitation with BMI is that it doesn’t tell you if the weight is fat or lean.
That’s why you can’t make a judgment call on BMI alone.
A better predictor of long term health is Waist to height
ratio. Researchers have been using this ratio for a while. And in a recent
review article reported that it is a tool than BMI or weight or waist
circumference (Ashwell, 2012)
What is the magic number? 50%. So your waist should not be more than half your height. For
this ratio your waist is measured right on top of the iliac crest. On top of
the love handles.
If you gradually losing inches but the weight on the scale
stays the same, you are losing fat and gaining muscle. So you need to change
your focus from weight management to waist management.
Need to lose some
inches? Proper nutrition is the first step. Exercise will increase the
caloric burn. And you don’t need a gym membership. Dig deeper into this blog
and you’ll find a variety of no equipment home workouts.
Reference
Ashwell, Gunn and Gibson. Waist-to-height
ratio is a better screening tool than waist circumference and BMI for adult
cardiometabolic risk factors: systematic review and meta-analysis. Obesity
reviews, (2012) 13, 275-286.
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