MAINTAINING A HEALTHY WEIGHT
It is important to maintain a healthy body weight. It is unhealthy to carry too little
body fat, just as it is unhealthy to carry too much. In terms of your heart, if you are
overweight, you risk the following complications:
• coronary heart disease / heart attack
• diabetes
• high blood pressure
• high blood cholesterol
A healthy weight varies from person to person. You need to work out your ‘Body Mass Index’ to
see if you are within a healthy weight range. The mathematics of the calculation is below. There
are also many websites online that will do it for you. Do a search in ‘Google’ for “Body Mass
Index”+Calculator.
BMI Calculations:
• Work out your height in metres and multiply the figure by itself.
• Measure your weight in kilograms
• Divide the weight by the height squared (ie. the answer to Q1). For example, you might
be 1.76m tall and weigh 74kg. The calculation would then be:
1.76 x 1.76 = 3.0976. BMI would be 74 divided by 3.0976 = 23.9.
What Does it Mean?
Normal weight = 18.5-24.9
Overweight = 25-29.9
Obesity = BMI of 30 or greater
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Why do we put on weight?
Maintaining a healthy weight is based on eating and exercise. Although fad diets and dieting
companies will suggest links between the types of food and the ways that you eat foods as being
important to how much you weigh, really it is about eating enough kilojoules to fuel your body.
You will gain weight if:
1. You eat and drink more kilojoules than your body needs for the exercise you do
2. You aren’t active enough
3. If you both eat too much and aren’t active
The best way to find out if your weight is a health risk is to check with your general physician or
Dr Flood.
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