engleski

BMI classification and bioelectrical impedance (BIA) of body composition in men and the relationship with health.

Rationale: Although limitations of BMI in assessing body composition are recognized, it is still widely used for overweight/obesity classification. This could be misleading when assessing men. We evaluated the adequacy of grouping young-to-middle age men in BMI categories by comparing them with body composition measurements obtained by BIA. Methods: The study included n=180 healthy, male forestry workers, 31.4±6.7y, BMI, 28.0±4.4kg/m2, involved in everyday, high occupational physical activity. Body composition and parameters of autonomic nervous system to indicate chronic stress and inflammation were measured with portable devices, BIA-ACC and PPG-StressFlow (BioTekna®, Marcon-Venice, Italy), respectively. The protocol was approved by the Institutional review board and each subject signed the informed consent. Results: According to BMI categories, 33.4%, 36.6% and 30% of participants were normal-weight, overweight and obese, respectively. Respective BIA measured skeletal muscle mass as % of body weight, was 28.5%, 27.2% and 26.3%. Although BMI-classified obese participants had lower skeletal mass %, their fat mass was not significantly higher compared to those in other groups. The % of extracellular body fluid was higher, and phase angle was lower in BMI obese category compared to normal-weight and overweight categories. However, according to the participants’ skeletal mass, although they were categorized as obese according to BMI, their health status was not paralleled with that of their BMI status. Conclusion: Although 2/3 of participants were classified in overweight/obese categories by BMI, they had comparable muscle mass. Their health parameters were not significantly different. Therefore, BMI classification might lead to some misleading classifications in body composition and subsequent consequences.

Body composition, bioimpedance, men health

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