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Child-teen Bmi Calculator: What's The Right Weight For My Child? |
By:
Dave Davis |
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Child-teen Bmi Calculator: What's The Right Weight For My Child?
Dave Davis
Did you know BMI Calculators are different between adults and children? It turns out you need more than just the BMI (Body Mass Index) to screen your child for weight related health risks. You also need to determine their percentile.
So what is BMI?
Much research has shown that BMI directly correlates with a person's body fat. Since BMI is easy to calculate it is used all around the world to screen adults for weight related health risks. BMI is just your weight in kilograms divided by the square of your height in meters. So if you are 5 foot 10, 1.78 meters, tall and you weigh 190 pounds, 86.4 kg, then your BMI is 86.4 / (1.78 x 1.78) = 27.3; You can also calculate your BMI in English units using the following formula. Take your weight in pounds multiply by 703 and then divide by the square of your height in inches. So if you are 6 feet tall, 72 inches, and weight 200 pounds then you would take 200 x 703 / (72 x 72) = 27.1
What is percentile? How is it determined?
Since adults bodies are fully developed BMI can be used directly to determine their weight category and risk levels. However since kids bodies are changing so quickly and at different rates their BMI must be normalized by comparing it to thousands of other kids their same age and gender. Where your child ranks compared to the other kids the same age and sex is their percentile.
How is BMI and Percentile interpreted for children and teens?
First your child's BMI is determined by accurately measuring their height and weight and then calculating their BMI using the same formula used for adults. But then the BMI plus their age and gender is used to determine our child's percentile. Finally your child is put into one of four groups based on their percentile. If your child's percentile is less than 5 then your child is considered underweight. If your child's percentile from 5 to less than 85 then they are in the healthy range. If your child's percentile is from 85 to less than 95 then they are in the At Risk of being overweight range. If your child's percentile is 95 or greater then your child is considered overweight.
What is a healthy weight range for my child?
You can use either a chart specific for your child's age and gender to determine the weight for them to be at the 5th percentile and the weight for them to be at the 85th percentile. This wide weight range would be considered their healthy weight range.
When is this method of screening a child for weight related problems inaccurate?
1) This method is not valid for children < 2 or 20 years old or greater; 2) This method and BMI specifically is not accurate if the child is very athletic or muscular; 3) This method and BMI specifically is not accurate if the child is taller than 7 feet.
Why is childhood overweight considered a health problem?
Doctors are concerned about the rise of overweight children and youth because according to the CDC being overweight leads to the following health problems: Heart Disease, Type 2 Diabetes, Asthma, Sleep Apnea, and Social discrimination leading to low self-esteem. Additional studies have shown that overweight children and teens are more likely to become obese as adults.
What causes obesity and overweight?
Our bodies are very efficient at saving as fat any excess calories we consume that are not used by our muscles. Thus there are only two ways to get overweight. Either you are ingesting too many calories for the amount of activities you are doing or the amount of activities is too small to use up the amount of calories you are ingesting. The World Health Organization (WHO) says there are two reasons the problem is getting worse.
1) Global shift in diet towards increased intake of energy dense foods that are high in fat and sugars but low in vitamins, minerals, and micro nutrients. {Comment: Manufacturers of processed food have just been giving us what we want, food that taste good, easy/quick to prepare, but not what is best for our bodies.}
2) Trends towards decreased physical activity due to the increasingly sedentary nature of many forms of work, changing modes of transportation, and increasing urbanization. {Comment: It's obvious that having machines do the work while we sit at a desk, having cars transport us almost to the door at work, store, restaurant, or home reduces walking, and living in cities or suburbs reduces almost all needs for any physical activities. No wonder we are getting fatter.}
Author Dave Davis has written many articles on diet plans. For an online child BMI Calculator go to http://MyDietForWeightLoss.com/Child-Teen-BMI-Calculator) Child-Teen-BMI-Calculator. For information on how you can develop your own custom diet plan http://MyDietForWeightLoss.com/ MyDietForWeightLoss.com Click here to get your own http://www.uberarticles.com/home.php?id=17082&b=79 unique version of this article.
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Article Source: http://www.statssheet.com/articles/article64486.html |
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