Waist-to-Hip Ratio Calculator

How to Measure Your Waist and Hips

• Waist:
  1. Stand.
  2. Remove your shirt and loosen your belt.
  3. Feel for the bottom of the rib cage and the top of the hip bone.
  4. Maneuver the tape against your skin to the narrowest natural place. This is usually mid-way between the top of your hip bone and the bottom of the rib cage, not your belly button.
  5. Relax your stomach.
  6. Pull the tape so it is horizontal, and flat against your skin. That is your waist measurement.


• Hips:
  1. Stand.
  2. Loosen your belt.
  3. Maneuver the tape against your skin so it is on top of each hip bone.
  4. Make sure it is level.
  5. Pull the tape so it is flat against your skin.  That is your hip measurement.

How to Interpret Your Waist-to-Hip Ratio (WHR)

• Your WHR measures how your body fat is distributed.
• WHR is a better predictor of calcification of the arteries than your waist measurement or BMI.
• WHR predicts heart disease and hardening of the arteries before they cause symptoms, better than how much you weigh or what your waist is.

• Your waist measurement tells you how much abdominal fat—beneath the surface—you have.
• Too much fat beneath the surface of your waist is an active, hormone-producing organ in the body.
• Your risk of diabetes, heart disease and high blood pressure are greater as these measurements rise.

Reference:
The Association of Differing Measures of Overweight and Obesity With Prevalent Atherosclerosis. J Am Coll Cardiol, 2007; 50:752-759, WHR: http://content.onlinejacc.org/cgi/content/abstract/j.jacc.2007.04.066v1