According to new research from Rutgers Health published in JAMA Network Open, measuring waist circumference—either alone or in conjunction with body mass index (BMI)—is nearly as effective as a more complex approach that incorporates multiple body measurements for identifying health risks associated with excess body fat. The study, which analyzed data from 1,900 U.S. adults aged 20 to 59 from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, compared various obesity screening methods against a highly accurate body fat determination method. While a recently proposed obesity framework that combines BMI, waist circumference, waist-to-height ratio, and waist-to-hip ratio identified more individuals with excess body fat, the Rutgers researchers found that simpler methods, particularly waist circumference alone, offered comparable accuracy with greater practicality in clinical settings. Lead author Aayush Visaria emphasizes that waist measurement can serve as an early indicator of unhealthy body fat levels, potentially enabling earlier recognition of related health concerns such as diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and certain cancers. The findings also underscore a limitation of BMI, which, when used in isolation, fails to identify a significant number of individuals meeting obesity criteria based on body fat percentage, highlighting the value of waist circumference in capturing health risks that BMI may miss. Source