Posts Tagged ‘BMI’

Some Common Terms Used in Health/Nutrition: A to E

Have you come across some words/terms such as antioxidants, BMI, essential amino acids, Probiotics, omegas etc., while reading a topic on health/nutrition? The chances are; you have come across such words/terms, but could not understand clearly what the meaning of these words. To solve your problem of not understanding commonly used terms in nutrition/medicine/health I came up with this article.

Alcohol:

The term alcohol usually denotes ethanol or ethyl alcohol, the commonly consumed alcoholic drinks, such as whisky, vodka, scotch, brandy, beer, wine etc. It contains high calories (7 calories per gram).

Amino acids:

These are smaller building blocks of proteins. A protein molecule is made up of several (a few to several hundreds or thousands) amino acids joined together in different sequences (which differentiate it from other protein). Proteins are made up of 20 different amino acids. A protein may have all the 20 amino acids or may not have all 20. Examples of common human proteins are albumin, globulin etc.

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Why Plan Diet for Underweight?

Underweight is body weight of 10% to 20% lower than ideal body weight for age, height and sex or if BMI or body mass index is less than 18.5. BMI is calculated by “dividing body weight (in kilogram) by height in meter square. For example if body weight of a person is 50 kg and height is 1.5 meter than his BMI will be 22.22 (50 divided by 1.5 x 1.5 = 22.22).

If a person is underweight than he/she may have several medical problems like growth retardation (mainly in children), complication during pregnancy, increased susceptibility to infection, poor general health and related problems. The main aim of planning diet for underweight is to avoid these complications by bringing the body weight to normal. All the complication of underweight can be eliminated by bringing the body weight of underweight to normal.

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What are the Causes of Underweight?

Definition of underweight: The definition of underweight can be given as “a condition when body weight of an individual is 10-20% less than ideal body weight for his/her height, age and sex”. Underweight can also be defined if a person’s BMI (body mass index) is less than 18.5. Using BMI to define underweight is more suitable and practicable and is used commonly.

If you are underweight it may be an indication of some underlying health problem or it may not be possible to find out the exact cause of underweight, despite extensive investigations. Sometime underweight may be an indication of serious underlying pathology, such as cancer or HIV infection.

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Check Your BMI & Health Status

Here is a ready for checking (BMI) list. In the first left column your height in centimeters and to the right of that column your body weight. The nos. 17,18.5, 20, 22, 25, 30, 35 and 40 denotes BMI. The BMI of 18.5 to 30 is the normal range. BMI above 30 is obesity and not good for health. BMI below 18.5 is underweight, it is also not good for health.

If your weight and height do not match in the list you can calculate your own BMI by the following formula:

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Obesity: A Scientific Perspective

Obesity is presence of excess quantity of body fat, more than scientifically acceptable limit. Deposition of excess food as body fat is a physiological response of the body developed during the time of evolution to overcome food shortage during lean periods. But presently it is causing serious problem because of easy access to food and sedentary lifestyle. Obesity is most commonly measured in terms of BMI (body mass index). BMI is calculated by the following formula, body weight is divided by height in meter square, (body weight/ height2). Body height is in meters. Obesity is defined as BMI more than 30. For normal people BMI is from 18.5 to 30. BMI below 18.5 is taken as underweight. Risk of cardiovascular disease is minimal at this range of BMI. There are other formulas for measurement of obesity. This formula of calculating obesity by BMI is also not foolproof, because if a person is very muscular like body builders, he may have very little body fat but his BMI may be >30. We can not call him obese. Overweight can be called when BMI is form 25 to 30.

Prevalence of obesity: obesity is more common problem in industrialized countries. For example in USA prevalence of obesity was about 30% in the year 2000, and it is increasing. In the year 1975 to 1980 it was 15%. In 2000 as many as 64% of adult population above 20 years were overweight, as calculated by BMI of >25.

Now the burning question is do the obese eat more than the lean?

Answer to this question is not simple. This question has created much debate. There are methodological difficulties in determining food intake. Some of the obese individuals claim they eat less, and these claims are supported by the results of food intake questionnaires. However, it is now established that the average energy expenditure increases with obesity, due to the fact that metabolically active lean tissue mass increases. According to law of thermodynamics, therefore an obese person must eat more to maintain his increased body weight. But certain people who are predisposed to obesity due to there genetic structure, may develop obesity without absolute increase in calorie consumption.

What is the state of energy expenditure in obesity?

The average daily energy expenditure is more in obesity, due to metabolically active extra tissue mass. But when weight is lost the energy expenditure is reduced and for maintenance of body weight less energy is used than it would have been in case of lean person at that weight. This is one of the main reasons why obese people find it difficult to maintain body weight after bringing down body weight to normal.

Causes of obesity: Most important of obesity is eating more food than required to maintain ideal body weight. Next important cause is genetics. There are also certain medical conditions where body weight increases for example, diabetes.

Consequences of obesity: Obesity can cause many serious consequences. It can cause type 2 diabetes mellitus (non insulin dependent diabetes), cardiovascular diseases, gall bladder stone, cancers, lung disease, reproductive disorder, bone and joint disease etc.