Steren MED-110 Manual De Instrucciones página 45

Muscle fat
The human body requires certain amount of body fat for staying healthy, because this
substance is important to regulate body temperature, providing energy, protect and isolate organs
(as if a mattress), as well as to produce hormones (particularly in women).
To enable these functions, there are stored two different fat types in the body; one of them is called
the essential, and it is stored (in small amounts) in the muscles, central nervous system (spinal cord
and brain), organs and bone marrow (soft and spongy material found in the bones interior). For man,
this type of lipid covers between 3% and 4% of total body weight, while in women it adds about 10%
or 12%. In females, the percentage is higher because it includes the fat of the breast tissue and
deposits on hips, abdomen and pelvis, where it is necessary for the functioning of the reproductive
system.
On the other hand, there are also stored fat, which is where the body stores reserve energy
throughout the body.
The healthy men percentage must be between 8 and 19 per cent, and women from 11% to 21%.
Body mass
It is a widely used parameter to evaluate weight loss and know if a person suffers or not obesity.
However, you cannot use it as the sole indicator.
If a person has an excess of body fat and has a normal body mass index, we must be very careful,
because it can be a sedentary individual who carries great risks in his body and if this happens, our
ally must be physical activity to eliminate fat and increase lean mass while maintaining the weight.
On the other hand, we can have a BMI that indicates obesity, but assessing body fat, we find that the
person has a normal proportion or even lower which should, as it can be the case among athletes, for
example: in people with moderate levels of physical activity and balanced diet, BMI may show a value
very similar to the percentage of fat in the body and this clearly indicates that both can go together,
or not, depending on the levels of exercise and the diet that we carry.
By this we mean that BMI is useful, but in addition, we need to know how is our body and most
importantly, the amount of fat in the body, because an excess implies serious health consequences.
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