For years, Body Mass Index (BMI) has been a widely used measure to determine a person’s health based on their height and weight.
However, a new metric is emerging that provides a more comprehensive picture of health risk: the Body Roundness Index (BRI).
Unlike BMI, which relies solely on height and weight, BRI takes into account both height and waist circumference, offering a more accurate assessment of an individual’s body fat distribution and health risks, according to the National Institutes of Health. “BRI is a more accurate measure of body fat distribution compared to BMI,” said Dr Vibhu Kawatra, Pulmonologist, Pediatrician, and Allergy Specialist from New Delhi. “It provides a better understanding of how fat is distributed around the body, particularly around the abdomen, which is a more significant indicator of health risks such as diabetes and heart disease.”
A recent study published in JAMA Network Open supports this, stating that BRI is an evidence-backed tool that better predicts mortality risk than BMI.
BRI VS BMI
One key reason is that BRI accounts for abdominal fat, which is closely linked to metabolic disorders and cardiovascular problems, unlike BMI, which focuses on overall body weight without considering fat distribution. The origins of BRI date back to 2013, when it was developed by U.S. researchers as a response to growing concerns over BMI’s limitations.
While BMI can sometimes inaccurately categorise individuals as overweight or healthy, BRI offers a more nuanced view.
By measuring both waist circumference and height, BRI generates a value, typically between 1 and 20, with extreme values suggesting higher health risks.
BRI helps place individuals in a healthy or unhealthy category by better quantifying fat around the abdomen, which BMI cannot do.
While more advanced methods like dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (Dexa) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) are available to measure body fat levels, these techniques are resource-intensive. As Alice Bullas, Senior Research Fellow at Sheffield Hallam University, wrote in The Conversation, “This may explain why BMI has remained the go-to method for measuring health since it first started being used in the latter part of the 20th century.” Despite these limitations, BRI offers a more accessible alternative. Online calculators now allow individuals to input their height and waist measurements to quickly determine their BRI score and see if they fall within the “healthy zone.”
As awareness of the Body Roundness Index grows, it is likely to become a valuable tool for assessing health risks, especially for those concerned about metabolic health and visceral fat.
