# Should You Get a DEXA Scan?

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Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/food-for-thought-with-colleen-patrick-goudreau-690262/should-you-get-a-dexa-scan.md
Podcast: [Food for Thought with Colleen Patrick-Goudreau](https://stenobird.com/podcast/food-for-thought-with-colleen-patrick-goudreau-690262)
Published: 2026-03-06T20:30:09+00:00
Episode link: https://www.colleenpatrickgoudreau.com/p/should-you-get-a-dexa-scan
Audio file: https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/190142139/44e0c4caffbbd67bdc551dcf01e5fc9e.mp3
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Duration seconds: 2474

## Resource

This podcast is listener-supported. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. In today’s episode, we take a closer look at DEXA scans — what they measure, what the numbers actually mean, and whether getting one is worth it. These scans are becoming more common in fitness and wellness settings, providing insight into body fat, muscle mass, visceral fat, bone density, and even something called “biological age.” But how should we interpret those numbers? What can they tell us about our health — and what can’t they tell us? Using my own recent scan as a starting point, we explore how body composition data can serve as a baseline for understanding our bodies, tracking changes over time, and making more informed decisions about strength training, fat loss, and bone health. In this episode, we talk about: * The difference between total-body composition scans and clinical DEXA scans used to diagnose osteopenia or osteoporosis * What body fat percentage actually measures — and why it’s different from BMI * The concept of body recomposition: reducing body fat while maintaining or gaining muscle * Why visceral fat matters for metabolic and cardiovascular health * What biological age means — and why it should be interpreted cautiously * How to understand T-scores in bone density reports * Why the hip and spine are the gold-standard sites for diagnostic bone density scans And we close by talking about what really matters most: what we do with the information once we have it — including how strength training, nutrition, and lifestyle choices influence fat, muscle, and bone as we age. 🎧 Listen to the full episode of Food for Thought , celebrating 20 years of practical inspiration for living compassionately, sustainably, and healthfully. Mo…

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## Transcript

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