Preparing for a Safe and Consistent Scan

To achieve the most reliable and comparable readings:

• Scan at the same time of day.
• Wear similar clothing each time.
• Remove shoes and socks.
• Avoid scanning immediately after exercise.
• Avoid scanning directly after a large meal.
• Maintain a consistent level of hydration.
• Use the same Boditrax machine whenever possible.

Consistency of scanning conditions is often more important than the individual numbers shown on any single scan.

Yes. Users should remove all footwear, including shoes, socks, tights, stockings, and any other items covering the feet.

The Boditrax electrodes require direct contact with bare skin to accurately measure impedance. Anything between the feet and the electrodes may affect the quality of the measurement and reduce accuracy.

Yes. Hydration is one of the most important factors affecting BIA measurements.

Dehydration may cause the body fat percentage to appear higher and muscle mass lower than expected. Conversely, being unusually well hydrated may influence readings in the opposite direction.

It is best to avoid scanning immediately after a large meal or significant fluid intake.

Food and fluid consumption can temporarily affect impedance measurements and may result in readings that differ from your normal baseline.

Ideally, scans should be taken before exercise or after the body has had sufficient time to recover and rehydrate.

Exercise can temporarily alter fluid distribution throughout the body, which may affect impedance measurements and lead to temporary changes in body composition readings.

Yes. Exercise can significantly alter body water distribution.

During and after exercise, the body loses fluid through sweat and shifts water between different tissues. These temporary changes can affect impedance measurements and may result in fluctuations in body fat percentage, muscle mass, and total body water readings.

For best results, allow sufficient time to cool down, rehydrate, and return to your normal hydration status before taking a scan.

Yes. Alcohol can contribute to dehydration and may influence body composition measurements.

Consuming alcohol prior to a scan may affect fluid balance within the body and lead to temporary changes in impedance measurements. This can potentially impact body fat, muscle mass, and body water estimates.

For the most accurate and consistent results, avoid consuming alcohol for several hours before a scan.

For the most consistent and reliable measurements:

• Maintain normal day-to-day hydration.
• Avoid excessive fluid intake immediately before scanning.
• Avoid scanning when dehydrated.
• Scan at a similar time of day each time.
• Avoid intensive exercise immediately before a scan.
• Avoid alcohol prior to scanning.
• Follow the same routine before each measurement whenever possible.

The key objective is consistency. The more similar your scanning conditions are each time, the more meaningful your results and progress tracking will be.

Hydration and fluid distribution naturally change throughout the day.

Factors such as eating, drinking, exercise, sweating, and normal daily activity can all influence body water levels and impedance measurements. As a result, scans taken at different times of the day may produce slightly different body composition results.

For the most consistent comparisons, try to scan at the same time of day whenever possible.

No. Individuals fitted with a pacemaker, implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD), or other active electronic medical device should not use Boditrax.

Because the device passes a small electrical current through the body to calculate composition measurements, its use is not recommended for anyone with these types of implanted medical devices.

No. Boditrax scans are not recommended during pregnancy.

Although the electrical current used is extremely small, body composition readings during pregnancy can also be significantly affected by the physiological changes that occur throughout pregnancy. Pregnant users should not use the body composition functions of the machine.

When considering the potential effect of implants on body composition readings, it is important to first understand how the Boditrax system measures and calculates body composition.

Boditrax utilises low-voltage electrical signals to perform a Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis (BIA). During a scan, a small electrical current is passed through the body and the machine measures the level of electrical impedance (resistance) encountered. These impedance measurements are then used to estimate body composition metrics such as body fat percentage, muscle mass, and total body water.

As a general principle, muscle tissue is a good conductor of electricity because it contains a high proportion of water and electrolytes, whereas fat tissue is a relatively poor conductor due to its lower water content. The Boditrax algorithm uses these differences in conductivity when calculating body composition.

Therefore, the presence of an implant may influence the readings depending on the material from which it is made:

• Metal implants are highly conductive and may provide a pathway with lower electrical resistance than surrounding tissue. This could potentially result in the affected limb appearing to have a greater proportion of lean tissue or muscle mass than is actually present, leading to an artificially elevated muscle reading on that side of the body.
• Ceramic or other non-conductive implants have much higher electrical resistance and may impede the flow of the electrical signal. In these circumstances, the machine may interpret the increased resistance as a higher proportion of fat tissue, which could lead to an artificially elevated body fat reading in the affected area.

The overall impact on the scan results will depend on factors such as the size, location, and material of the implant, as well as the specific body segment involved. In many cases, the effect on whole-body measurements may be relatively small, but where a large implant is present, some variation in the segmental readings can be expected.

For this reason, when reviewing body composition results for individuals with implants, it is often more useful to focus on long-term trends and changes over time rather than absolute values from a single scan, as the presence of the implant is likely to influence readings consistently from one scan to the next.

Height, age-related information and sex-at-birth inputs can be used by the measurement algorithm. Incorrect information may change calculated results even when the scale’s weight reading is unchanged.