BMI is one of the best-known acronyms in the health space. A tool used for more than a century to assess whether you’re a healthy weight for your height. But a revolutionary new kid on the block could soon replace the Body Mass Index.
Introducing Body Volume Indicator (BVI), the brainchild of Mayo Clinic researchers that’s being billed as a game-changing alternative measurement.
How come? BVI compares your total body volume to the volume of your abdomen (which BMI doesn’t account for). Why’s that better: our waists are great windows into our health future, The Mayo Clinic’s Dr. Jose Medina Inojosa tells Business Insider.
Belly fat can give docs an indicator of our risk for things like type 2 diabetes, high total cholesterol and cardiovascular disease – the Nurses’ Health Study, which looked at 40,000+ women over a 16-year period, found a strong link between waist circumference and heart disease.
“By measuring weight and body fat with a focus on the abdomen,” adds Medina Inojosa to BI, the “BVI offers a new, enhanced potential diagnostic tool.”
Experts have argued BMI is outdated for years now – its focus on just height and weight means, for example, that lean people with muscle can fall into the overweight range. Could BVI be the solution? Watch this space!