Anthropometric Assessment

What is anthropometry?

It is a measurement of a variety of physical dimensions of the body that provides one set of information about the nutritional health of your body at any given point in time.

Different physical measurements may be used for adults and children.

What are some common physical measurements?

Height and weight are among the common measurements. Their relationship with each other is reported as BMI, the body mass index. It is an index that is used to report the appropriateness of your weight and for assessing risk of certain diseases.

Your dietitian may enhance your assessment with a variety of other physical measurements as necessary.

Skin fold thickness measurements:

This is another set of less-common, physical measurements performed by a skilled dietitian using a special set of calipers to estimate fat tissue at different locations in the body. This information is used in combination with other aspects of your nutritional assessment to give specialized information about your nutritional health.

Athletes for example may wish to combine this detailed information with the body composition data to tailor their health program.

What are the benefits of anthropometric measurements?

Physical measurements are a component of your nutrition assessment that are combined with other strategies to evaluate your nutrition health as well as predict your risk of health issues and disease. Using this information, your dietitian will help you to tailor a corrective as well as preventive nutrition regimen to meet your personal goals.