New research verifies the accuracy of several measures used to estimate the minimum weight that’s acceptable and healthy for college athletes.

In recent years, there has been growing recognition that some college athletes are using unhealthy weight loss practices to maintain a particular weight class. The problem is especially pronounced in college wrestling. In fact, three collegiate wrestlers died in a little over a month during 2003 after using unsafe methods to lose weight.

The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) now requires that collegiate wrestlers undergo a certification program to make sure that they are not underweight.

A comprehensive way of determining a person’s minimum healthy weight is something called the four-component model, which takes into account body density, bone mineral content and total body water. The problem is that the four-component model is too expensive and time-consuming to be practical.

There are other ways to estimate minimum body weight. In the new study, Dr. R. Randall Clark and his colleagues at the University of Wisconsin in Madison compared the accuracy of four such methods with the four-component model.

The researchers confirmed the accuracy of the different methods of measuring body composition, although the precision of each technique varied.

One of the methods involves measuring skin folds, and another involves weighing a person while immersed in water. Another technique measures X-ray energy absorbed by bone and soft tissues, while another method determines the impedance to a weak electric current passed through the body.

The various techniques were studied in a group of 53 college athletes.

Compared to the “gold standard” of four-component testing, the other techniques fared pretty well, the researchers report in the journal Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise.

But two of the methods, underwater weighing and skin-fold testing, were much more precise than the other techniques, according to the report. The more precise methods are the ones approved by the NCAA.

The move to measure body composition in wrestlers is “a landmark effort,” Clark told Reuters Health. “It will trickle down to other sports for both males and females.

He noted that college teams already monitor lightweight female rowers to make sure that they maintain healthy levels of body fat.

The focus of body composition testing has been on making sure that athletes do not lose too much weight, but the techniques could be useful for the many children who could stand to lose a pound or two, according to Clark.

The Wisconsin researcher said that he hopes body composition measurements will become a routine part of every physical exam.

SOURCE: Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, May 2004.