Does Body Mass Index Adequately Capture the Relation of Body Composition and Body Size to Health Outcomes?

Overview

Journal Am J Epidemiol

Publisher Oxford University Press

Specialty Public Health

Date 1998 Feb 11

PMID 9457007

Citations 47

Authors

K B Michels

S Greenland

B A Rosner

Affiliations

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Abstract

Body mass index (BMI) has become the most commonly used index of body composition in epidemiologic research. It has displaced weight, height, and other measures of body composition. In this paper, the authors show that use of BMI alone does not always capture adequately the joint relation of body composition and body size to health outcomes, and that such use often represents implausible restrictions on the relation. Use of body mass index and height or weight and height will often be needed to describe this relation and to control confounding by these variables.

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