Visceral fat determining device

Abstract

A visceral fat determining device is disclosed which can be used easily at home for example and can obtain information on visceral fat. The visceral fat determining device comprises: input means for inputting personal data that represents vital characteristics of the patient; a data processing unit capable of performing various calculations; and a display device capable of displaying the personal data and results of the calculations. Upon inputting of a waist size which is a girth of trunk of the patient, and a hip size which is a girth of buttocks of the patient, quantitative information on abdominal visceral fat of the patient is given through a calculation based on WHR which is a ratio of the waist size to the hip size (waist size / hip size).

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION [0001] This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10 / 018,874, filed Feb. 26, 2002, entitled VISCERAL FAT DETERMINING DEVICE, which is a national phase application based on PCT International Application No. PCT / JP01 / 03213 and in turn claims priority to Japanese Pat. App. Ser. No. 2000-116381, filed Apr. 18, 2000. The entire disclosure of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10 / 018,874 is herein incorporated by reference for all purposes.TECHNICAL FIELD [0002] The present invention relates to a visceral fat determining device capable of obtaining information on visceral fat, which is part of internal body fat of a human body, through a simple operation. BACKGROUND ART [0003] Attention has been paid to human internal body fat in view of health maintenance. Specifically, increase in the internal body fat promotes adult diseases for example, and therefore monitoring the internal body fat can lead to prevention of these diseas...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0015] The state of abdominal visceral fat of the patient is believed to have a very high correlation with WHR which is one of physical characteristics of the patient. In the visceral fat determining device according to the present invention, quantitative information on the abdominal visceral fat of the patient can be calculated based on WHR=WL / HL, namely a ratio between the gluteal girth which is a hip size of the patient and the abdominal girth WL which is a waist size of the patient. Therefore, the visceral fat determining device according to the present invention enables to obtain the information on the abdominal visceral fat which is information deeply related to the health of the patient, easily at home or the like.

[0077] Another possible constitution is that the abdominal girth WL and the gluteal girth HL measured by the size measuring means are inputted to the data processing unit. This eliminates need for the patient to make an input via the input means.

Problems solved by technology

Therefore, even if BMI or the body fat ratio gives a value which does not indicate any health problems, it is not necessarily possible to determine if there is any health problem in relation with the visceral fat.

However, such a diagnosis using CT scanning or the like is only possible with a large scale apparatus installed at a major hospital, and the results can be obtained only after a certain length of time necessary for measurement and data analysis.

Therefore, the method is not available as a handy means for obtaining visceral fat information at home for example.

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