Comparison of whole body and segmental bioimpedance methodologies for estimating total body water

We compared the whole body (WB) and segmental bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) methodologies in a group of healthy adults (n = 25). It has been suggested that the segmental methodology may overcome the difficulty in generating a single algorithm to predict total body water (TBW) in all groups whether healthy or not. We measured TBW, using D2O dilution, and WB and segmental BIA parameters. Cole-Cole analysis was used to determine the impedance at the characteristic frequency (Zc). The correlation between TBW (by D2O dilution) and segmental BIA measures (multiple regression, r = 0.90, p < 0.001, SEE = 3.1 L) was not significantly higher than the correlation between TBW (D2O dilution) and WB BIA measures (simple regression, r = 0.85, p < 0.001, SEE = 3.6 L). Others have observed this "lack of improvement" in a group of healthy subjects. The true value of the segmental BIA methodology may lie in applications involving groups with altered distributions of segmental and compartmental fluid.