Bathroom scales

A set of bathroom scales can be an important aid to maintaining good health and monitoring weight and overall body health.

A basic set of scales will provide a weight display in pounds (or stones and pounds in the UK) or in kilos in Europe. However there are a number of more advanced bathroom scales that can provide some additional body-weight information. Many people find this extra information useful when monitoring their weight or dieting.

Advanced bathroom scales

Many of the more advanced bathroom scale models offer some additional body analyzing functions over and above the basic body weight reading.

These extra features can include measuring body fat levels and sometimes body water levels (i.e. how hydrated the body is). Both of these measurements can be very important to those who need to continually monitor the condition of their body. E.g. this could include someone who is on a diet, someone with high blood pressure, or someone who falls into the bariatric category.

All but the most basic of bathroom scales will have a digital display (and possibly an audible one as well) and there will be different settings to allow the selection of the measurement mode that is required.

Many of these scales will also have a memory that enables a number of past readings to be stored for reference. This can be useful if a doctor wants a patient under his care to monitor their own weight and provide him with their weight loss or gain history.

Digital bathroom scales use batteries, however many hundreds of measurements can normally be taken before battery replacement is required. Most batteries will last for a few years.

A typical set of (non bariatric) scales will normally have the capacity to take weight measurements of up to approximately 350 pounds (25 stone). For greater weights bariatric scales will be required.