BMI is a quick, cheap way for doctors to estimate body fat and screen for conditions like heart disease and diabetes.
But medicine has long known that BMI is problematic and unnuanced. By using it, groups of people have fallen through the cracks and conditions have been caught late.
So, some doctors want to add nuance – to consider race when using BMI. But using race in medicine comes with its own problems.
So what’s the way forward? To find out, we talk to Katie Wu, a science writer at The Atlantic.
Interested in more science health stories? Email us your question at [email protected].
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This episode was produced by Arundathi Nair. It was edited by Rebecca Ramirez. Tyler Jones checked the facts. The audio engineer was Robert Rodriguez.
