BMI what a load of twoddle!!

Just been given a BMI chart in work (Work in health promotion) and I figured I would kill a lil time and have a look at mine!! Shock horror at the min I’m in the over weight section but for me to be health it says that I can go down to as low as 9 Stone (126lb) I can fully guarantee if I got that low I would look like death warmed up!! My lightest ever was 11 and a half stone and even then I was looking rather close to death warmed up.

Does anyone here actually believe in BMI or like me think its a load of twoddle??

Replies

  • yarwell
    yarwell Posts: 10,477 Member
    it's a statistic - weight in kg divided by height in metres squared - so to me there's nothing to believe or otherwise.

    The use of the statistic to define people as healthy, overweight etc is a bit more subjective, you will notice the bands are quite wide like healthy from memory goes from 18.5 to 25 you might be healthy at 24 and a weedy Romanian girl at 18.5.
  • kittyr77
    kittyr77 Posts: 419 Member
    I agree to a point. I think its more of a guide and doesn't take in for example a muscular build or large bone structure.
    At my lowest weight i had bmi around 19 which is healthy on the 18.5-25 scale and my periods stopped for six months and everyone was worried about how thin i looked. I have a tiny frame too, size 3.5 feet, so imagine what id look like if i had a larger frame?!
    May be look at waist size, body fat and waist-hip ratio as a better measure. Or simply how you look and feel!