On one hand, I like the publishing policy of NIH, because more dissemination of information is a good thing.
But on the other, so many people gloss over or are just blatantly unaware that NIH specifically doesn't endorse anything about anything published there, that they're just a clearing house. And then people either infer authority from the domain, or they use that to consciously or subconsciously push their belief.
The authors correlated late night eating and HbA1c. That's more relevant to people with Type 2 diabetes than the general population.
The authors found no correlation between skipping breakfast and HbA1c. That's also more relevant to people with Type 2 diabetes than the general population.
Managing type 2 diabetes can occupy a non-trivial amount of mental space. Though probably not as much as managing type one diabetes.
Why do people keep making this argument? It's a terrible argument.
BMI and body fat are extremely strongly correlated. People with a very high BMI are all obese or morbidly obese. And people with a very low BMI are almost all underweight. BMI is a very simple, easy to calculate and useful metric. It works across countries and across time.
BMI is just one metric. It doesn't tell you everything and knowing only the BMI of an individual isn't proof of anything. But average BMI is higher in Texas than Vietnam despite Texas having way more more bodybuilders. People in Texas have higher BMI because people in Texas are fatter. That's the truth. BMI denialism confounds me.
I wouldn't make the all claim, but you must admit that a world renowned body builder is an extreme outlier. Obviously a DEXA scan would be far more accurate, but it seems clear from the literature I've read that BMI is a pretty good guide for most people.
Arnie is also called an outlier. You don’t dismiss BMI just because. A doctor will factor that in before declaring a patient unhealthy. Otherwise, it works for most people and might be appropriate in large studies.
Well, thankfully people in real life have eyes and brain and can seee that someone is just a heavy pile of muscle vs donut cosplayer, i.e can spot the 0.1% of muscle mass builders from the 99.9% of fatsos.
"A metric have 0.1% outliers so it is bad metric" is a horrible take
A lot of people are pointing out Arnold as your example, but fail to mention he first won the Mr Olympia more than 50 years ago! Our understanding of exercise and nutrition has improved since those times. You no longer have to be an outlier in genetics or dedication to achieve good results.
I'm far from a genetic outlier, but I go to the gym for 3-4 60-90 minute sessions a week. My program is efficient, I don't take steroids, and my nutrition is decent (but not great). I'm 5'10" and 202 pounds (29 BMI).
I find it disingenuous that people use the top performers as an excuse. There is a middle ground where a modest investment will reap significant returns.
If maintaining the healthy function of my body is skewing my BMI as to be useless, then perhaps BMI is a poor metric.
> Arnold Schwarzenegger is 6'2" and weighed 235lbs at contest (30.2 BMI) and 260lbs in the off season (33.4 BMI).
I understand what you're saying, but I think a person that wins Mr. Olympia seven times is clearly a severe, severe, severe outlier. For a decade he was THE most well-built body on the planet. Literally ONE in 5 billion.
Obviously no measurement is "perfect" for "everyone", but BMI is a very good indicator for an extremely high percentage of the population.
For the average person that isn't doing something radical with their body for a specific goal (powerlifer, bodybuilder, olympian, etc.) BMI is a fantastic first pass indicator of how things are going general health/weight wise.
Severe obesity is 40+ BMI. About 1 in 16 children and adolescents ages 2 to 19 (6.1%) have severe obesity, according to niddk.nih.gov. It's a staggeringly high percentage of the population.
Even when you take a 1 in 5 billion outlier like Arnold he still doesn't come close to crossing this threshold, despite his high calorie body-builder diet.
I thought this was well known. I’ve not known a gym that takes BMI seriously. People like Messi who are relatively lean and fit are overweight per the BMI scale.
It’s because people take their BMI and become shocked about where they land. It takes like a small beer gut to land in to obese.
BMI isn’t generally used as a picture of overall health anyway. More often, it’s used as a measure for health issue probability. As Texas BMI raises, it can be used to calculate the increasing chances of a huge variety of health problems.
You've already pointed out that it depends on what you're using it for, and that's it's not especially useful on an individual basis. Why the weird Holocaust association?
BMI isn't a great measure for a lot of reasons.
There's way too much variation in height and muscle mass. There's variation based on race as well, for example CMS has different standards for DPP eligibility if you're asian [1].
BMI was created in 1830, and has always been of limited usefulness. There are much better methods for measuring health in relation to total body fat.
It is completely reasonable to be critical of it [2] when it's used improperly (which is very common).
I'm firmly in the 'overweight' category based on BMI, at 15% bodyfat, and I wouldn't classify myself as jacked. I have a bit more lean muscle than most from cycling but definitely not a 'gym body'.
Yeah, I'm 'overweight'. I run a lot and generally in pretty good shape. But I could absolutely lose 10-20 lbs of fat. Just because you're a little overweight doesn't mean you're unhealthy.
If you could lose 10-20 lbs of fat (and don't just mean, you have 10-20 lbs of fat left), then tautologically it would be healthier if you did lose the weight. The degree to which it makes you healthier is debatable, but that extra weight isn't making you more healthy (outside of people that are very underweight).
yeah pretty much. a lot of guys who do even a little physical labor for a living or hobby are easily in the overweight category despite being strong and not that fat at least going by visual appearance . such as guys in construction, landscaping, or moving. a lot of people who are borderline obese do not even look that fat especially clothed. the stereotypical 'fat guy' with the overhanging or balloon stomach is more like a BMI of 40.
Although this has little bearing on the study, BMI works best for people of average height. Tall thin people have a high BMI, and unthin short people have a low BMI.
Math reason: the square term for height is incorrect, people are three dimensional and a cube would be more appropriate (the formula is (lbweight/(inchheight^2 * 703))).
Check the BMI of tall and short people that you know in this chart:
It’s really not a good metric. It’s incredibly noisy. “Are you fat” isn’t something that needs a noisy metric. And it makes analyses messy when bmi is used as a measure of fatness.
Are you maybe hoping for a metric of general healthiness? Measuring body fat accurately on your own is tough. Most people know their height and can find a scale to use so you can get a rough idea of what bucket you're in. It's good for most people. If you're working out and pretty athletic idk why you'd stress about your bmi being a little high.
sadly it's often misused. When there are things like BMI qualifications on medical interventions or where jobs have physical requirements.
I knew a guy who really wanted to join the fire service but couldn't meet the BMI requirements as he was in the 'obese' BMI bucket, In this case he was just very broad and very muscular (built like the colloquial brick shithouse). By their requirements jonah lomu would not have been able to join because he was 'obese'
Most people you see at a gym will probably be classified as 'overweight'. The fact of the matter is muscle is counted against you in BMI, and it takes very little to cross into the 'overweight' threshold. I would have to cut down to around 12% or lower body fat to be considered 'healthy', and I'm far from jacked.
1. Being sub 12% body fat (the highest BMI that would be considered healthy) is arguably unhealthy in and of it's own
2. Being on the low end of healthy would be, if my math serves me, -2.5% body fat
3. BMI does not distinguish between unhealthy / overweight, and fit / healthy (which should be the primary goal of such a metric?)
4. BMI aligns the best outcomes with those that will minimize muscle mass
It's not that BMI does not have it's place, but let's call a spade a spade.
>Being sub 12% body fat (the highest BMI that would be considered healthy) is arguably unhealthy in and of it's own
12% body fat isn't a BMI, what are you trying to say?
BMI is not supposed to bucket you into healthy or unhealthy. It is a ratio of your weight to height. You're right that there are a lot of people who are overweight but are perfectly healthy. I think your problem is that you're viewing BMI as some kind of blanket good or bad health number. It is what it is, and it's just one aspect of your physical health, which you probably shouldn't be trying to capture in a single number anyway.
Go get a physical exam from a doctor if you want something comprehensive. If you just want a general height/weight ratio, BMI is pretty good for most people.
Pretty much only true if you are a body builder or someone else with an unusual amount of muscle mass relative to your height. For the vast majority of people though BMI is fine.
There is little point of doing a study based on BMI when what you want is body fat. BMI is imperfect. It’s fine when you want to give people a quick metric for them to assess their fitness by themselves. People who are extremely fit with a high BMI already know they are extremely fit after all. It’s not fine when you want to analyse the effect of different life styles.
But on the other, so many people gloss over or are just blatantly unaware that NIH specifically doesn't endorse anything about anything published there, that they're just a clearing house. And then people either infer authority from the domain, or they use that to consciously or subconsciously push their belief.