By definition, overweight is having a BMI over 25, and obesity is having a BMI over 30. (If you are unsure of how to calculate yours, there’s a great BMI calculator here at DietsInReview.com.) Why are these numbers so alarming? Being overweight increases your chances of declining health. Even President Obama is catching on to this trend, as he said in a recent town hall address, “If we can help somebody control obesity, they are less likely to get diabetes…which will help keep health care costs down.”

Being overweight increases your chances of many obesity related diseases like heart disease, thyroid malfunction, stroke, diabetes, and the list goes on and on. And it’s really a downward spiral; being heavy means that it’s more difficult to exercise, which only increases your chances of gaining more weight, which makes it even MORE difficult to exercise, and bam! You have an entire set of complications staring you in the face.

If you lose some weight, those health complications can be more easily managed; but it’s not as easy as it sounds. It is MUCH more work to get out there and start walking than it is to sit on the couch and watch television. Trust me, I know. Do it for your family, do it for yourself, do it for whatever – but if you are overweight, even losing a few pounds will help you in the long run.

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Why is Fat the New Norm?

If you are overweight – but only a little bit – congratulations, you are probably going to live the longest of any of us. That’s right, according to a new study people who were overweight, but not obese, were in prime position to outlive everyone else.

In the study, published in the journal Obesity, experts followed people 25 and older for 12 years. What they found was that people in the body mass index range of 25-29.9 were 17 percent less likely to die than those who were normal weight (a BMI of 18.5-24.9). Those who were underweight, a BMI less than 18.5, were 73 percent more likely to die than those who were normal weight.

“Overweight may not be the problem we thought it was,” said Dr. David H. Feeny, a senior investigator at Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research in Portland, Oregon, and one of the authors of the study. “Overweight was protective.”

The study was thorough and took into account issues that may lead people to poke holes in it: age, gender, people’s smoking habits, exercise, alcohol consumption, and diseases such as cancer.

In 2007, scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Cancer Institute reported that overweight adults were less likely than normal weight adults to die from a variety of diseases, including infections and lung disease.

Feeny says the findings may be due to the fact that a little excess weight is protective for the elderly. But the one possible explanation that would diffuse the controversial aspect of the findings is that maybe medication, used to treat health conditions associated with being overweight, is responsible for prolonging their lives.

(via: The New York Times)

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Overweight People May Live Longest

There is now more diversity amongst pregnant women than there was in 1990, as well as more multiple births and pregnant women tend to be older than they used to be. The most daunting statistic is that more women today become pregnant while overweight or obese, and continue to gain weight, putting themselves at risk for chronic disease and increasing health risks for the baby.

“Women not only should be within a normal BMI range when they conceive, but also should gain within the ranges recommended in the new guidelines,” per the new IOM report.

A committee was formed at the IOM to re-examine the pregnancy weight guidelines, and focused on “factors that affect pregnancy begin before conception and continue through the first year after delivery.”

An agreement was made that “One of the most important modifiers of pregnancy weight gain and its impact on a mother’s and her baby’s health is a woman’s weight at the start of pregnancy.” The best measure of this is BMI, and the guidelines have been updated to match the World Health Organization (WHO) BMI categorizations.

The new IOM guidelines on pregnancy weight gain differ from the old in two significant ways:

• Now based on WHO BMI categorizations, rather than Metropolitan Life insurance tables.
• Offers specific, relatively narrow ranges of recommended weight gain for obese women.

The new guidelines suggest that a woman of normal weight (BMI range of 18.5-24.9) should have a total weight gain of 25-35 pounds during pregnancy with about one pound/week gained in the last two trimesters. For obese women, they should have a total weight gain of 11-20 pounds with about .5 pound/week gained in the last two trimesters.

Advisements for special circumstances include:

• Pregnant teens should follow adult BMI categorizations.
• Twin pregnancy weight gain should be for normal BMI 37-54 pounds, overweight 31-50 pounds and obese 25-42 pounds.

The IOM encourages that these weight gain guidelines be followed in conjunction with dietary and exercise recommendations provided by your physician or caregiver.

Learn your BMI now with our free BMI calculator.

See the full report at IOM.

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New Guidelines for Weight Gain During Pregnancy Released by Institute of Medicine

Example for a 132 pound, 5′4″ female:
59.87 kg / 2.640625 m = BMI 22.7

According to the BMI chart, 18.5 or less is considered underweight, 18.5 to 24.9 is normal weight, 25.0 to 29.9 is overweight, and 30.0 and greater is considered obese.

It is important to know and understand your BMI because if it is too high, you may have increased risk of certain diseases such as diabetes, stroke, heart, high blood pressure or cholesterol. Proper nutrition and exercise will help with further weight gain or weight reduction. Since the BMI chart is a little bias (does not take into account muscle mass or fat mass, just total weight), I recommend checking your percent body fat rather than calculating your BMI. By doing so, you can track your progress a little better. If you have any questions, please let me know!

For a free BMI calculator and weight loss tracker, sign-up for MyDIR.

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Understanding Body Mass Index

In Fall 2009 the screenings will begin, and students in grades 1, 4, 7 and 10 will be tested. Parents will have the option to opt-out. In addition to the BMI (Body Mass Index), which is a standardized method of determining how under or over weight a person is, the report card will also share ways in which parents can help their child’s weight and encourage parents to meet with a pediatrician.

“We think it would be a mistake to just send home a number and leave parents hanging without providing an interpretation,” said Dr. Lauren Smith, medical director of the state Department of Public Health.

A healthy, or normal, BMI can range from 14 for a two-year-old to 26 for an 18-year-old.

Children's BMI chart (via Health.com)

Source: Boston Globe

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Fat Report Cards Issued to Massachusetts School Children

According to a new analysis of 57 studies that included nearly a million people, average obesity can shorten your life between 2-4 years. Being very obese pushes it to 8-10 years!

In the study, men and women who had BMIs between 30 and 35 took 2-4 years off their lives. Having a BMI between 40 and 45 is the range that can take a decade off your life. Every 5 BMI points that you add to your total boosts mortality risk by 30 percent!

“This is scary and something that we should pay close attention to,” says Ali Mokdad, Ph.D., a professor of global health at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington in Seattle.

(via: CNN)

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Obesity Can Shorten Your Life By a Decade!

Ronayne is seeking more than $25,000 for weight and age discrimination. The 5 foot 11 inch man is 61-years-old and weights 225 pounds, according to state records. This puts his BMI at more than 31, which is considered “obese.”

Spokesman for the company, Garrett Morelock, says Ronayne “wasn’t a good salesman” and that the lawsuit is “absurd.”

(Via: Associated Press)

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Man Fired for Too Much “Waist”

In a recent health article by Karly Randolph Pitman, she elucidated five tips for finding your healthy weight. The five tips are:

1) Recognize Your Own Body and its Own History. Self magazine features a healthy weight calculator that takes into account your age, height, children and activity level. As a caveat, I took this health assessment and if I weighed what the Self Happy Weight calculator suggested I could weigh, I would not be very happy. While Pitman’s other tips for finding your ideal weight are pretty spot-on, this Self Happy Weight Calculator could use some fine-tuning.

2) Aim for a healthy body-fat percentage. Measuring your body-fat percentage takes into account your height, weight, circumference of your waist, neck and hips, as well as your activity level. Since the measurement requires precise direction in taking the measurements, here is an instructional body-fat calculator to guide you along.

3) Use a critical eye when looking at female celebrities. The pressure to be thin in Hollywood is probably a burden that most of us can’t comprehend, nor would we like to. The key to determining your ideal weight is to refrain from comparing yourself to a super-thin Hollywood actress or singer. It may be easier said than done, but the more you practice it, the easier it will become and the more accepting of your own body you will be.

4) Be patient in your weight loss goals: Even though many diet pills and quack diets promise to help you lose 10 pounds in 4 days, these drastic weight loss plans are not only impractical, but they can also be unsafe. It took you some time to get to the weight you are today, and it will consequently take you some time to lose it.

5) Practice Non-Attachment: It’s a Buddhist concept to be able to celebrate something or someone, but also be fully aware that its existence is not permanent. Remember this as you step on the scale, think back to what your weight was in high school or remember how tough it was to lose those post-baby pounds.

These sage words of advice are as easy to apply as stepping on the scale a few times throughout the day. Your weight fluctuates not just from meal-to-meal, but from year-to-year. By surrendering to the current of change that underscores our entire lives, you will be more able to accept where you are. Now.

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Find Your Happy Weight

Obesity and overweight are calculated using the BMI (Body Mass Index) formula. Someone with a BMI of 25 to 29 is classified as overweight, while 30 to 40 counts as obese. Anything over a 40 is morbidly obese.

You can calculate your BMI by dividing your weight in pounds by height in inches squared, and then multiplying by a conversion factor of 703.

Numbers from the National Center for Health Statistics show that more than 34 percent of Americans are obese, compared to 32.7 percent who are overweight. It said just under 6 percent are “extremely” obese.

“Although the prevalence of obesity has more than doubled since 1980, the prevalence of overweight has remained stable over the same time period,” said the NCHS report.

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More People Obese than Overweight