¹Obesity Research Center, St Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York, USA

²Department of Human Nutrition, Wageningen Agricultural University, Wageningen, The Netherlands

³Department of Community Health, Wright State University, Yellow Springs, OH, USA

^aCorrespondence: Zi-Mian Wang, Weight Control Unit, 1090 Amsterdam Avenue, 14th Floor, New York, NY 10025, USA.

OBJECTIVE: To compare 16 currently used total body fat methods to a six-compartment criterion model based on in vivo neutron activation analysis.

DESIGN: Observational, inter-method comparison study.

SUBJECTS: Twenty-three healthy subjects (17 male and 6 female).

MEASUREMENTS: Total body water (TBW) was measured by tritium dilution; body volume by underwater weighing (UWW); total body fat and bone mineral by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA), total body potassium (TBK) by whole-body ⁴⁰K counting; total body carbon, nitrogen, calcium, phosphorus, sodium and chlorine by in vivo neutron activation analysis; skinfolds/circumferences by anthropometry (Anth); and resistance by single-frequency bioimpedance analysis (BIA).

RESULTS: The average of total body fat mass measurements by the six-compartment neutron activation model was 19.7±10.2 kg (mean±s.d.) and comparable estimates by other methods ranged from 17.4-24.3 kg. Although all 16 methods were highly correlated with the six-compartment criterion model, three groups emerged based on their comparative characteristics (technical error, coefficient of reliability, Bland-Altman analysis) relative to criterion fat estimates, in decreasing order of agreement: 1. multi-compartment model methods of Baumgartner (19.5±9.9 kg), Heymsfield (19.6±9.9 kg), Selinger (19.7±10.2 kg) and Siri-3C (19.6±9.9 kg); 2. DXA (20.0±10.8 kg), Pace-TBW (18.8±10.1 kg), Siri-2C (20.0±9.9 kg), and Brozek-UWW (19.4±9.2 kg) methods; and 3. Segal-BIA (17.4±7.2 kg), Forbes-TBN (21.8±10.5 kg), Durnin-Anth (22.1±9.5 kg), Forbes-TBK (22.9±11.9 kg), and Steinkamp-Anth (24.3±9.5 kg) methods.

CONCLUSION: Relative to criterion fat estimates, body composition methods can be organized into three groups based on inter-method comparisons including technical error, coefficient of reliability and Bland-Altman analysis. These initial groupings may prove useful in establishing the clinical and research role of the many available fat estimation methods.

total body fat mass; multi-compartment model; body composition