Just got my medical examination results today. Apparently, I'm overweight. I know I shouldn't be doubting official results from a clinic but how is 23.8 considered overweight ??? Maybe I'm worrying about this too much or Japan's BMI rate is just that low. Help.
by yoonieschim
22 comments
Yes, the brackets for overweight and obesity are shifted a bit in Japan. If you don’t want to lose weight to look like a local be ready for doctors to warn you about being a metabo every health check 😂
25+ is generally accepted as overweight but it can depend on a few things.
Japanese doctors are notorious for fat shaming during physicals.
Not sure if the scale is different in Japan but I think 25+ is considered overweight. They might be looking at other factors though — they place a lot of importance on waist circumference, for example.
Personally I wouldn’t be too worried at 23.8 unless they’ve given you an explanation of what you need to be careful of.
It’s the upper range of normal but it’s easy to go higher without watching your diet. I had a similar number a few years ago, just got the try to do better talk and that was it. Last year dropped to 23.1 and no talk. This year 22.8 and just a great job comment.
Welcome to Japan.
Your clothing size has also gone up overnight.
Looking forward to your next medical where the 79 years old doc will point a finger to your belly then PUSH said finder into said belly and say: “FATTO des ne?”.
If this was a medical check for work, then please be aware that this is not diagnostic. If any results concern you, then you should follow up with a doctor.
Many doctors in japan cite a bmi over 24 is overweight. I have had some doctors tell me that for females, it’s 23. Ultimately, bmi is not an accurate assessment of health alone and should be considered with other data.
a lot if not most japanese people are skinny fat i wouldn’t worry too much.
First year in Japan I got my health check results back claiming I’m “overweight”.
I was 76 kilos at 188cm.
Next year I’d gained eight kilos. Somehow I was not “overweight” then.
Pretty sure that either the BMI isn’t all they’re looking at, or they sometimes just make shit up.
BMI is notoriously flawed to begin with, so learning to ignore it is a good idea regardless. Do you eat a varied diet and get in a decent amount of activity? Are the blood markers in your exam results in good ranges? Those are much more meaningful than the BMI.
No, you should alwqys question everything, no matter the source. And who ever is still using BMI as only reference in 2025 is an idiot.
https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/why-you-shouldnt-rely-on-bmi-alone
BMI is not worth paying attention to. It makes too much assumptions about average body type and people who are muscular will almost always be shown as obese.
Being active and overweight is far healthier than being skinny and sitting around all day. Bmi is a graveside guage on health. I go to the gym a lot and have a few extra pounds of muscle. I’m overweight even though a good portion of it is muscle, not fat.
Don’t think about BMI so much. If you workout then it won’t be accurate.
The important factors are visceral fat, body fat %, lean muscle mass, and your blood work. My BMI can go over 25 yet my score on an inbody scan will be 90/100 because the factors that do matter are in a very healthy bracket.
Even my Japanese doctors tell me to ignore BMI as it is outdated.
I read the Japanese national health insurance guidelines the other day.
Basically, the health insurance system is bankrupt. There are not enough people joining to fund all the health care that elderly people need, so something must be done.
The biggest way to cut cost is through preventative medicine. e.g. One of the cheapest ways to prevent diabetes is set the bar low for BMI. It costs nothing to tell all the people, once a year, to lose weight.
All the checks in the health system are designed to statistically reduce the cost of treating issues that are preventable over the whole population.
If you understand it this way you won’t take it personally. When it comes to the annual health check. It is not for your personal benefit, it is for the benefit of the whole society that your health track is directed to one of less risk and thus less future expense to the system.
Call it fat shaming, call it good advice, they don’t care. Only the statistics at the end of the year matter.
And, oh yeah! It is not for the doctor to question that BMI might not be the best data point. Any alertnative one has to be as cheap as BMI to gather. That’s why they added waist size to the checks in 2008.
24 bmi is teetering towards overweight even in America. Its definitely over in Asia.
I’m also “overweight” in Japan but I don’t have fat stored it’s all muscle. I often disregard their pleas of “lose weight”, no dear doctor I need to lose fat, no weight.
23.8 is not usually considered overweight in Japan. They may have given you a lower score based on your waist measurement or how you answered questions about your lifestyle. If you answered that you don’t exercise or that you have an unhealthy diet, it could be that they gave you a B score because you are more at risk to become overweight as you age without lifestyle changes. But this is purely my speculation.
I worked my ass off the last year and lost ~30Kg to get me, finally, into the normal BMI range. Went for the checkup and got my results but still a “D” and “Overweight.” Checked the results and the range for waist was 0-84.9cm, I was measured at 85.2 and therefore failed. I’m at the end of my weight loss journey, my waist is almost measuring bone to bone accross a flat stomach, I cannot lose any more weight so I guess I just fail this category forever. Very demotivating.
yes, Im 6-2,go to the gym every day and the doc said I was overweight… they don’t really consider muscle mass
BMI doesn’t tell much, but unless you are quite muscular, yes 23.8 is overweight. Japan has a more healthy standard than, say, the US.
Nothing to be too worried, just make sure to eat healthy and get regular exercise and not gain more fat weight. That’s what matters.Â
According to the Japanese BMI chart, you aren’t considered obese until your BMI is over 25. The whole BMI thing is problematic. I do a lot of weight training. Muscle, which is heavier than fat, accounts for roughly 75% of my body weight, according to my body composition analysis. I always come out as obese on the BMI chart even though I’m physically fit.
One of my old bosses use to fat shame everyone in the office, particularly the women. He would read through all of the medical check reports and use things in those to publicly mock employees, like writing their weights on a white board. Nearly all of them were less than 60kg and he’d still call them fat.
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