InBody Supplying U.S. Marine Corps With Body Composition Analysis Devices

Decades after implementing service-wide body composition standards to measure recruits’ readiness, the U.S. Marine Corps is revamping its current assessment method via the InBody 770, a body composition analyzer from InBody.
 
“The Marines are renowned for their readiness to serve,” InBody GSA Specialist Jade Chavez said. “We’re thrilled that InBody devices will provide the Corps with the data they need to meet the Marines’ high standards.”

InBody is already supplying devices to multiple branches of the U.S. military, including the Army, Air Force, and Navy.

“It’s been an honor to serve the U.S. Military for the past 10 years through our partnerships and GSA contracts,” InBody USA CEO Harry Yun said.  “We’re thankful for this deal with the Marines and look forward to building upon this relationship and accomplishing great things for the health of our armed forces.”
 
Since the 1970s, the Marine Corps has used body composition assessment to track physical capacity for military service, evaluating service members through an abdominal circumference-focused method that uses empirical equations to estimate body fat.
In 1980, the U.S. Department of Defense directed other military services to follow the Marines’ example, with all the services eventually using a shared set of equations to calculate body composition.
 
However, a new Marine Corps study found that recently developed devices can validate the accuracy of empirical estimations and optimize their health, fitness and performance. Devices like the InBody 770, which use an imperceptible electrical current, improve upon the precision of the abdominal circumference method because they assess body water, body fat and muscle mass on an individual basis, without using empirical estimations.
 
While empirical data is useful for setting health benchmarks, it doesn’t always capture natural variations in how people carry their weight and can skew results toward the average, making it less helpful for assessing especially muscular individuals.
 
But InBody’s bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) technology, which has long been used by human performance specialists to train athletes, supplies highly reliable data. Under the order, the majority of Marine Corps installations in the U.S. and abroad will receive InBody devices. More than 250 InBody 770s are scheduled for distribution.
 
“Everything we do is about warfighting,” said Capt. Danielle Phillips, a Marine Corps spokeswoman. “The practical, accurate and unbiased data provided via BIA ensure we maintain a healthy, ready force.”
 
InBody develops biomedical technologies that simplify the understanding of health and wellness. The company’s medical-grade devices are used by professionals and consumers in the medical, fitness, research and corporate wellness verticals. InBody delivers biomedical technologies and services in more than 110 countries, with six international branch offices and a global distribution network.