Adult Assessment Tools Or Diagnostic Tests: BMI Assignment

Adult Assessment Tools Or Diagnostic Tests: BMI Assignment

The body mass index (BMI) is a screening tool utilised in health care to identify persons with unhealthy levels of weight including overweight, obese, or underweight (Khanna et al., 2022). BMI is a ratio of weight to height and is calculated by dividing body weight in kilograms by body height in metres squared. The BMI quotient has been used since the mid-nineteenth century with its calculation of weight-to-height being universally expressed in kg/m2 (Zierle-Ghosh and Jan, 2021). BMI is not a diagnostic tool but rather a screening or assessment tool. This discussion describes the BMI assessment tool, and its purpose, how it is conducted, the information it gathers, and details on validity and reliability and issues with sensitivity, reliability, and predictive values Adult Assessment Tools Or Diagnostic Tests: BMI Assignment.

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What is its purpose?

The BMI assessment tool is a universally recommended instrument for classifying adiposity in adults, teens, and children. The adiposity will describe and classify an individual as underweight, normal weight, overweight, or obese categories. With such classifications, it would be possible to evaluate the risk for diabetes, hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, cancer, and other chronic illnesses in children teens and adults (Khanna et al., 2022). Additionally, childhood BMI acts as a forecaster for disease and health in the later lives of children as adults. With over two-thirds of the American population being overweight or obese, the assessment tool is a critical gauge for developing chronic illnesses and educates patients on the need to either gain weight or lose weight to avoid potential health hazards common to a specific category of weight.

A BMI increase by a value of 5.9 kg/m2 leads to a probable increase for type 2 diabetes by 1.16 and 1.09 in men and women respectively (Khanna et al., 2022). Individuals with BMI exceeding 35 kg/m2 had a greater risk for developing type 2 diabetes relative to individuals with BMIs lower than 23 kg/m2.

How is it conducted?

Among teenagers or children, BMI is both age-specific and sex-specific. Sex and age are taken into consideration for teens and children because the level of body fat varies between boys and girls and the level of body fat varies with age (Gutin, 2018). BMI is a calculation that involves obtaining a person’s weight in kilograms and obtaining the ratio by dividing that number in kilograms by the individual’s height in metres squared. A result is a unit in kg/m2. It is recommended that patients are screened for abnormal BMI at every appointment as part of an individual’s vital signs. Inaccurate BMI assessment can help primary care provider guide their care with regards to cholesterol workup and management, thyroid screening, diabetes screening, and diet exercise counseling. BMI = weight (kg) / height (m)^{2 Adult Assessment Tools Or Diagnostic Tests: BMI Assignment}

What information does it gather?

BMI majorly gathers information on the height and weight of an individual and uses it to estimate adiposity (Zierle-Ghosh and Jan, 2021). BMI depends on the accuracy of the scale being used to measure height and measure an individual’s weight. The assessment tool can be described as an objective evaluation. BMI classifications are: BMI < 18kg/m2 is underweight, 19-24.9 kg/m2 is normal, 25 – 29.9kg/m2 is overweight, 30 – 34.9 kg/m2 is class I obesity, 35 – 39.9 kg/m2 is class II obesity, and 40 kg/m2 and above is Class III obesity

The tool’s validity and reliability, sensitivity, and predictive values.

The accuracy of the BMI assessment tool as a suggestive tool of adiposity or body fitness differs depending on the level of an individual’s body fitness (Gutin, 2018). As a result among comparatively heavier children, BMI is a valid indicator of excess adiposity or body fitness. In the case of relatively slim children whose BMI-for-age could be less than the 85th percentile, the BMI value most likely indicates mass free of fat. The fat-free mass suggests body mass without the fat and comprises everything from the bones, skin, tendons, and ligaments to the organs and water content.

The usefulness of BMI is universally accepted as a classifying factor of body fitness. However, since it does not directly evaluate adipose tissue-like dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (DEXA), it can be potentially inaccurate (Zierle-Ghosh and Jan, 2021). For instance, individuals with lean body mass could be categorised as overweight when in actual sense they have a lower adiposity or body fat percentage. This is common among athletes and bodybuilders. Additionally, the physical adipose tissue distribution has been suggested in much literature to influence morbidity and mortality. The assessment tool may not account for this variation. During BMI calculation, squaring the height reduces the effect of leg length in taller persons. The squaring of height was done since most mass is confined within the trunk. Hence, this normalisation helps distribute equal mass to every height level and subtracts from BMI utility in the literature that differentiates types of bodies. Despite the aforementioned weaknesses, the assessment tool is universally accepted excellent means of categorising body weight.

Some literature may recommend BMI use in predicting chronic diseases like type 2 diabetes but other literature recommend other tools of assessment as more useful for this prediction. Compared to other measurements like waist-hip ratio, waist circumference, and waist-to-height ratio, BMI is the least effective forecaster for chronic illnesses like hypertension, diabetes, and dyslipidemia (Khanna et al., 2022). Such conclusions are because of BMI’s inability to consider central adiposity or fatness in the mid trunk. Additionally, some elderly persons cite normal or even lower scores of BMI when in actual sense they bear a higher fat-to-muscle ratio and should be assessed for secondary illnesses as obese.

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Conclusion

BMI is a universally acclaimed tool for categorising weight and classifying individuals as other underweight, normal weight, overweight, or obese. However, classifications should consider an individual’s occupational demands for weight like classifying individuals with greater amounts of muscle mass like bodybuilders and athletes. An athlete could be classified as overweight or obese because of excess amounts of muscle mass but could be bearing less adipose tissue. Hence, BMI is not sufficient independently at providing information on the distribution of fat-free mass to body weight Adult Assessment Tools Or Diagnostic Tests: BMI Assignment.

References

Gutin I. (2018). In BMI We Trust: Reframing the Body Mass Index as a Measure of Health. Social theory & health: STH, 16(3), 256–271. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41285-017-0055-0

Khanna, D., Peltzer, C., Kahar, P., & Parmar, M. S. (2022). Body Mass Index (BMI): A Screening Tool Analysis. Cureus, 14(2), e22119. https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.22119

Zierle-Ghosh, A., & Jan, A. (2021). Physiology, Body Mass Index. In StatPearls. StatPearls Publishing. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK535456/ Adult Assessment Tools Or Diagnostic Tests: BMI Assignment