March is National Nutrition Month and — if you’re like many — it may be a reminder that it’s time to refocus and reevaluate your goals for physical health. Maybe you started out the new year with the desire to lose weight, or maybe you are trying to keep tabs on your physical health as you age and enter a new stage of life. Whatever your motivation, it’s natural to begin feeling stuck or reaching a progress “plateau” around this time of year. But that doesn’t mean you should give up!
In order to understand where to go next on your wellness journey, you have to understand your unique body composition. This will answer questions about what your body needs most and how to provide it. Thankfully, there are diagnostic tests that can help physicians and patients alike better understand the factors that may be leading to a plateau in someone’s fitness journey. One of the best options is known as the DEXA Body Composition Scan.
What factors should I be considering regarding my physical health?
When it comes to measuring physical fitness, it’s not enough to just have a number on the scale. Weight only gives a small glimpse as to what’s happening within. That’s why many physicians and dieticians discuss body composition with their patients. This means that their looking at the combination of the individuals lean muscle mass and their overall body fat. If an individual’s body composition is disproportioned, it could lead to serious health problems.
Both, body fat and muscle mass are measured as percentages of the entire body. In order to maintain physical health, individuals usually look to keep both numbers within a certain range.
In general, body fat percentages should be anywhere between two and 24 percent for men and 10 and 31 percent for women. It’s important to note that body fat is not necessarily the enemy. It’s essential to have some fat on the body to function properly!
Muscle mass tends to decline with age. However, a healthy man between the ages of 20 to 39 should fall somewhere between 75 and 89 percent. On the other hand, a healthy woman of the same age should range anywhere from 63 to 75.5 percent.
What is the DEXA Scan?
The DEXA Scan is a low-powered X-ray scan that evaluates your body’s lean muscle mass, body fat, and bone density. In other words, the DEXA scan is a diagnostic test that can give you a detailed analysis of your body composition.
This procedure is incredibly quick. In fact, most scans only take between 6 to 8 minutes in an office setting so it is accessible at all times of the day! The scans are extremely low-powered and cause less exposure than a standard chest X-ray in a hospital setting.
How is DEXA different than other diagnostic tests?
What sets the DEXA scan apart from many other tests is its accuracy. It’s the only technology available that can effectively and non-invasively measure visceral body fat (VAT).
VAT is an important measurement because it’s body fat that can be found surrounding vital organs. VAT is often a cause of major health problems such as Type II Diabetes, high cholesterol, and heart disease.
Who should receive a DEXA scan?
The DEXA Scan is a safe and effective diagnostic test for anyone passionate or concerned about their physical health. DEXA is also a great option for individuals who may have a family history of certain diseases related to bone density, such as osteoporosis, or weight. Because the test lasts for under ten minutes and is a low-power X-ray, it’s completely safe for patients with pacemakers, surgical metals, or other implanted devices. DEXA can accommodate individuals who are up to 350 lbs and 6 ft 7 inches tall.
How can Liquivida and the DEXA Scan results guide my weight loss regimen?
The DEXA scan can answer many important questions about your body composition, such as:
- Where the highest percentage of body fat lies
- Overall body fat versus muscle mass
- Types of body fat within the body
- Potential health risks associated with body composition
After performing a DEXA Scan, practitioners can work with patients to identify certain changes that may need to be made to their diet and exercise regimen to meet their goals. However, beyond just lifestyle adjustments, a DEXA scan may be able to help point patients toward additional treatments to help reach their weight loss or health goals. For example, practitioners may recommend services like lipotropic injections or the recently FDA-approved semaglutide injections to help push the metabolism to the next level and burn troublesome fat.
Overall, the DEXA scan provides a window into the body’s needs to help all individuals take the next step on their wellness journey — wherever they may be.
So the question is: are you ready to start listening to your body? If so, book a private consultation with one of our experts in the DEXA scan, nutrition, and other services to help you reach your goals, avoid progress plateaus, and become the you you want to become.
