A recent study revealed that people are likely misdiagnosed as overweight or obese under the body mass index (BMI) system.
BMI is a way to easily measure body fat based on height and weight.
As per National Health Service (NHS), nearly 30% of adults in England were found to be obese in 2024, and 66% were overweight.
Researchers in Italy compared BMI to scans which analyse fat, muscle and bone in the body.
For the study, researchers included nearly 1,351 adults included, 19 were underweight, 787 were a normal weight, 354 were overweight and 191 were obese when they were measured by BMI.
People were then reclassified by using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) scans.
Results indicated that over a third (34%) of obese patients based on BMI were misclassified, and should be placed in the overweight category.
The remaining 53% were labelled overweight depending on their BMI and were in the wrong category.
Three-quarters of the misclassified overweight patients were considered normal weight when scanned.
While the rest should be placed in the obese category, as per the study that looked at adults who were referred to the Department of Neurosciences, Biomedicine and Movement Sciences at the University of Verona.
Despite the BMI being considered a reliable way to determine body weight status in the normal weight range, over a third of the general population was misclassified, the researchers stated.
They added that the current BMI classification "appears to inflate the prevalence of underweight, overweight and obesity among the general population".
