We have more than 400 muscles in our body that we use everyday. Thus, there are a few muscles that are under our control; shoulders, upper arms, chest, back waist, thighs and calves. If these muscles were used and maintained consistently, they will remain firm, flexible and well-balanced throughout your life.
Many of us seem to have accepted the “fact� that we have to fight a battle against waistline flab. However, to remain slim and fit we have to look past our abdomen to the other core muscles in our body.
Aerobic exercise such as jogging, brisk walking, swimming etc… burns calories whenever we are doing it. But, beyond aerobics, when you develop and maintained lean muscle mass through resistance exercise, the new active muscle fibers consume calories 24 hours a day, just to maintain themselves. You will even BURN YOUR FAT, even EVEN WHEN YOU ARE SLEEPING !(Hey..no kidding..it really works!!!  )
Well, those gadgets which only focus on specific part of your body are not recommended. Not worth it as it has no cardio benefit. Anyway, it depends, cause the choice is yours

Guys listen to this...hehehe.  
Our new teacher is in the forum .....welcome  

Mermaid..u can introduce urself at the INTRODUCTION section at the link i posted below

http://malaysianunderwater.com/Forums/YaBB.pl?board=General3

just "start a new topic"

We have more than 400 muscles in our body that we use everyday. Thus, there are a few muscles that are under our control; shoulders, upper arms, chest, back waist, thighs and calves. If these muscles were used and maintained consistently, they will remain firm, flexible and well-balanced throughout your life.
Many of us seem to have accepted the “fact� that we have to fight a battle against waistline flab. However, to remain slim and fit we have to look past our abdomen to the other core muscles in our body.
Aerobic exercise such as jogging, brisk walking, swimming etc… burns calories whenever we are doing it. But, beyond aerobics, when you develop and maintained lean muscle mass through resistance exercise, the new active muscle fibers consume calories 24 hours a day, just to maintain themselves. You will even BURN YOUR FAT, even EVEN WHEN YOU ARE SLEEPING !(Hey..no kidding..it really works!!!  )
Well, those gadgets which only focus on specific part of your body are not recommended. Not worth it as it has no cardio benefit. Anyway, it depends, cause the choice is yours

I think the issue here is whether BMI is accurate as a health indicator or not. Whatever muscles we are using, regardless if its aerobic activity or anaerobic activity, both have an impact on our BMI.

Mermaid_In_the_C, your post is very educational for everyone here, but it'll be more beneficial if you had posted it in the "Keeping Fit" thread in the Dive Medicine and Fitness link...strayed a bit from the topic,mind u, hehehe...

The BMI is just a guide to say whether you're underweight or overweight. It's useful in normally built person.

As you pointed out Sea Daemon... if you're all bulk (i.e full of muscle) the BMI would falsely indicate that you're OBESE.

The accuracy of BMI can be correlated with body fat measurement but it is not easy to measure... must use calipers to estimate fat at excessive folds.. did this a a med student but cannot remember la now..

What I suggest is everyone should do annual health checkups which consists of physical examination by a doctor (including blood pressure monitoring etc) and blood investigation to check their blood sugar level, cholestrol level, renal profile and whatever deemed necessary by your GP.

The cholestrol level nowadays is essential... many young lean persons may have a satisfactory BMI but cholestrol is sky high due to the ever 'healthy' malaysian mamak stall diet.

So I guess the take home message is... use it as a guide (esp if you're of normal built)  but don't forget the ANNUAL CHECKUPs.. Put that on your to do list