The Fat Problem

Health is wealth and a health conscious man is a role model for everybody. But, how many among us are sure that their favorite beverage is less on calories? Even if we prefer scrawny or fluffed up swill, with an added shot of caffeine or a siphon of syrup, the drink is adding fat and sugar more than we imagine. A recent study published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association found that non-alcoholic drinks constitute almost one quarter of calorie ingestion and half of all added sugar in the body of every American and Briton. In England, the love for gourmet drinks like lattes and spiced teas is responsible for concentrating fat around our waist. The American nutritional promotion group, the Center for Science in the Public Interest came with more startling revelation. According to it a Starbucks latte helps in adding more fat and sugar than something from McDonald’s. Jayne Hurley, the center’s nutritionist says, Most people wouldn’t consider packing in a quarter-pounder between breakfast and lunch. But it’s perfectly possible to get more than 500 calories in a Starbucks drink. Many people assume that drinks are not calorific, but some contain huge amounts of calories and fat. The following is the detail of fat and sugar in coffee drinks prepared by renowned beverage chains. LATTE Calories: Small, 200; large, 341. Fat: Small, 10.6g (6.6 saturated); large, 17.9g (11.2 saturated). Finding: Surprisingly injurious to health. How to make it healthier: Stick to skim milk. Try to reduce the calories in your large latte drop to 160 to curtail saturated fat to zero and still get a healthy dose (450mg) of calcium. CAPPUCINO Calories: Small, 122; large, 207. Finding: Surprisingly injurious to health. How to make it healthier: Add skimmed milk and cinnamon in place of chocolate to remove the fat and cut the calories to 129. ESPRESSO Calories: Single, 6; double, 11. Finding: Without sugar, this is the lowest-calorie coffee. How to make it healthier: Adding foamed milk and avoiding caramel and other flavors, you can reduce calorie intake. HOT CHOCOLATE Fat: Small, 18.7g (10.7g saturated); large, 27g (15.2g). Finding: A big cup has the calories and fat substance of three hot dogs How to make it healthier: Go for a small, no-whip, undernourished hot chocolate to drop your calories to 209. MOCHACalories: Small, 255; large, 484. Fat: Small, 9.3g (5.4g saturated); large, 25.3g (14.3g saturated). Finding: Very fatty. How to make it healthier: Order a small skimmed milk without cream. CHAI TEA LATTE Calories: Small, 210; large, 362. Fat: Small, 5.3g (3.3g saturated); large, 9.2g (5.7 saturated). Finding: A large gulp is more calorific than a cheese sandwich. How to make it healthier: Choose a milk-free iced tea or sugar-free black tea. To cut down the calories, the doctors prescribed the following five ways to follow while choosing a beverage in a coffee outlet. i) Ask for skimmed, non-fat milk to add. ii) Skip the whipped creams. iii) Ask for sugar-free syrups prepared with artificial sweeteners. iv) Low-fat milky drinks of 200mg of calcium should be preferred. v) Shun adding sugary toppings to your coffee.. Image Via: Daily Mail

Good news for fat people, who love to relish a bowl of soup as a part of their daily meals, as a new study has shown that soup could be the answer to reduce those extra fats. American researchers have found that people who take soup, as a starter just before their meals, reduce their calorie intake by a fifth in comparison to those who simply skip soup and eat the main course instead. However, the study has also emphasized the important fact that the soup should be low in calories because a creamy soup would make you fatter instead of cutting that extra flab. Julie Flood, who led the study, said: Consuming a first course of low-calorie soup in a variety of forms can help with managing weight. During the research four types of soup were given to four volunteers. The soup categories were broth and separate vegetables, chunky soup, chunky pureed soup and pureed soup. But all these soups had similar taste and some common ingredients viz. chicken broth, broccoli, potato, cauliflower, carrots and butter. Later it was found that thickness of the soup had nothing to do with reducing fats but those who took the low-calorie soup showed 20 per cent less calories intake. Dr. Barbara Rolls, professor of nutrition at Pennsylvania State University, said: Earlier work suggests that chunky soup may be the most filling type, so the purpose of this study was to determine whether different forms of soup might have different effects on food intake. Nevertheless these findings have come as surprise to scientists who were testing volumetrics theory, which tries to find out the effects of varied soup on obesity. Source: Telegraph

Are your loved ones battling with obesity unsuccessfully? Then, here is a sure fire way of seeing their pounds shed off. Instead of nagging them to get off the couch and exercise, motivate them by bribing with cash incentives for every pound they lose and this should do the trick! Yes, if the latest study is to be believed, people are willing to go to push themselves and work towards weight loss when you offer cash incentives. No, the incentives need not be a high amount; even a small amount of $7 per pound is enough to get them going. A group of over two hundred overweight employees in North Carolina were involved in the study. The employees were divided into three groups, of which, one group was not offered incentives, and the other two groups were offered incentives of $7 or $14 for each percentage of weight lost. What’s more, they were offered no help with diet or fitness tips. At the end of three months, those who were offered $14 lost the highest percentage of weight, followed by those who were offered $7 and the least weight loss occurred in the group who were offered no incentives at all. The study is still an ongoing one with the scientists following them up to check if they maintained the weight loss once the incentives were stopped. The idea is a great one especially for employers who have bear the health care costs of obesity related diseases of the employees. In fact, the over all cost of the incentives could be far less than the health care costs they have to shell out. What’s more, slimmer employees mean less sick leaves and better productivity! So, do we see the employees laughing all the way to the banks? Or is it the employers?

Pets have begun to follow their owners nowadays, at least in the physical sense. They are beginning to compete with their owners for the ballooning waistlines. If owners eat rich fatty foods and lead a sedentary lifestyle, how can the pets be left behind? After all, pets are their extended families! Pets these days have begun to enjoy watching the tube with their owners and are happily chowing up their favorite pet snacks their owners feed them and are growing obese. Wagging their tails is the maximum exercise they get! A study conducted shows that over one third of the pets in America are obese and as with humans, it is an area of concern as obesity takes a toll on the pet’s health and they suffer from diabetes and joint diseases. Pet food that is available in the market is another reason for this epidemic. The food that is manufactured for pets is cheap and has little nutritional value. Restricting a dog’s diet can extend its lifetime by almost 2 years. Dogs eating 25 percent less than their canine cohorts were less likely to have diabetes and osteoarthritis according to a study. What can you do? Clinical veterinary nutritionist Tony Buffington has some tips on keeping your pets fit and healthy. 1. Control portions. Feed your pets according to their body conditions score, which can be found online. 2. Go for a walk. Increase the animal’s activity, but do so gradually. If you and your pet have been spending most of your free time on the couch, start out slowly and make sure you’re both having fun. One study found that owners who exercised with their pets had more effective workouts than people exercising alone. 3. Let animals be animals. Hide treats for your cat around the house so it can put its hunting skills to work. Take your dog off its leash in a safe place outdoors and watch Fido’s spirited sprint. Image Source

The internal fat contiguous to vital organs like the heart, liver or pancreas even though invisible to the naked eye as compared to a fatty figure, yet is as perilous as the more noticeable external fat that bulges beneath our skin. This makes a lot of thin people to ponder twice before they feel secure. Being thin doesn’t automatically mean you’re not fat. The whole concept of being fat needs to be redefined. Says Dr. Jimmy Bell, a professor of molecular science at Imperial College, London. Since 1994, he and his team have inspected about 800 people with MRI machines to generate "fat maps" viewing where people amass fat. According to their survey figures, people who uphold their weight through diet rather than workouts are likely to have main deposits of internal fat, even they look slim. Thin people are lulled into false assumptions that as they’re not overweight, they’re hale and hearty. Even people with standard Body Mass Index scores have shocking levels of fat deposits inside. Dr. Louis Teichholz, chief of cardiology at Hackensack University Medical Center in New Jersey and pioneer in this field says, Just because someone is lean doesn’t make him or her immune to diabetes or other risk factors for heart disease. Bell’s team concludes that as many as 45% of women and 60% of men surveyed by them suffer from "TOFIs" —"thin outside, fat inside" including movie stars and models. People who have fat inside are basically on the verge of being obese. We obviously amass fat around the belly first, but after some point, the body starts storing it elsewhere. Internal fat contributes to the menace of heart disease and diabetes and is supposed to interrupt the body’s communication system. External fat on the other hand, stored under the skin, seldom splash throughout our vital organs and muscles. However, internal fat can be without difficulty burned off through exercise or even by developing strict dietary habits. When it comes to remaining fit, specialists say there is no short cut. A combination of diet and exercise must be made an important component of our lifestyle. Still, we can depend on height-weight proportion as an indicator of good health. Image Via:USA Today

While trying to fish out reasons behind your plumpy look, don’t wink at your job, as may be reason lies there! Actually, a new study comes up with concrete evidences proving higher psychological stress accompanied by lack of social support at work, paves the way for obesity. In other words, higher the stress levels, higher were the chances of turning obese. This conclusion is the result of an intensive study that lasted up to 19 years, while studying around 3,413 women and 6,895 men. All the participants were between the ages 35 to 55. According to an estimate, more than half of workers say they work under a great deal of stress and 77 percent say they feel burnout on the job. Primary causes for stress at work include: • Difficult co-workers (16%) • Unrealistic workload (15%) • Tight deadlines (11%) • Last minute projects (10%) • Overbearing or interfering boss (9%) The way stress stirs up obesity, could be understood to some extent from the facts mentioned below: • During stress, we tend to consume more calories in particular and more food in general • Stress is often followed by fatigue, generally leading to decreased level of physical activity. • Higher level of stress is often followed by imbalance in hormone system. All these factors either directly or indirectly stir up obesity. Therefore, in order to curb obesity level, it is too important to bridle the stress level, first. Here it must be mentioned that stress in workplace poses risk of not only obesity and other health problems, but comes as a threat to the world economy too, by prompting depression among workers, which is confirmed by a survey, according to which 45% of the office workers are depressed. Therefore, this will have to be ensured that stress doesn’t tide over the employees in working place, as it would hit not only employees’ health but health of global economy too

A recent study claims that those people who are obese have higher chances (6 times) of having the disease i.e — cancer of the gullet in comparison to those people who have normal or ideal weight. The study took place in Australia, it examined 793 people who have oesophageal cancer, and they were compared with nearly 1,580 people who were coordinated for age and place of dwelling. Chances of having the cancer of this type is more in those people who had the problem of gastric acid reflux, which has been linked with tumours. Obesity is considered to be highly problematic when we talk about his type cancer as it raises the risk factor to a great extent. Peoples with BMI of 40 or above were considered to be 6 times at greater risk in comparison to those people who have the BMI between 18.5 & 25, and it is generally said to be perfect BMI for having good and sound health. When these two factors –obesity & acid reflux got combined than it raises this risk to a very large extent. The chances of having this type of cancer is believed to be true in the case of – gullet cancer, when smoking & drinking were also taken in to consideration along with other factors. It was guessed that obesity work as fuel in raising the levels of insulin & thus as a result it strengthens the manufacturing of other hormone which is known as insulin like growth factor. Basically these hormones are well-known to fuel the cell formation & hamper a procedure known as apoptosis, in which a defective cell is provoked to do suicide. Both these circumstances promote the cancer growth. The lead researcher of the study is David Whiteman who is a professor at the Queensland Institute of Medical Research in Brisbane. He mentioned that now advance study will only tell whether this speculation or opponent’s assumption is correct. WHO has defined that — those persons who have BMI of 25 & 30 are considered to be overweight, but those who are above 30 falls in category of obese people. While those people who have a BMI of 40 or more are extremely obese. This study made its appearance in the British journal Gut. Image

Ever wondered why you find it difficult to shed those extra pounds before the big party you want to attend. Have those attempts to lose a few kilos to keep diabetes and other lifestyle related diseases in check proved futile? Well the answer lies in assessing not only your diet and exercise plans but also what body type you are. The body types are classified as: 1. Apple-shaped body-type ( The central portion of the body is bulky with fat deposits concentrated in the chest and abdomen regions). 2. Pear-shaped body ( The region below the waste-line is the site of fat deposits.Heavy hips, bulky thighs and buttocks characterize this body type). This body type determines as to how an individual will respond to various diet and exercise plans and this was the aim of a very recently published study in the Journal of American Medical Association. The subjects in the study were put on 2 different diet plans. In both plans the same amount of carbohydrates, proteins and fiber were provided but the amounts of healthy fat were varied with one diet plan encouraging intake of healthy fats while the second plan concentrating on low-fat intake. Subjects in this study showed varying results in terms of weight loss based on their body type, fat intake and insulin response. Those with apple shaped body and following a diet which encouraged consumption of healthy fats showed more weight loss and effective weight maintenance as compared to those with same body type but on a low-fat diet.The amount of insulin secreted by people of this body type was also high. The people with pear-shaped body type responded in same way to both the diet plans but were not so successful in keeping off the shed pounds as compared to their apple-shaped counterparts over an 18-month period.This group showed secretion of low amounts on insulin. So before we decide to embark on a weight-loss diet and exercise plan it is of significance to see which plan best suits are body type. We should go in for a plan which is in accordance with our physiology and will prove beneficial to our health interests. Image credits: Red Orbit, Tescodiets Source:Red Orbit

It can be a bit alarming for the normal Canadian to know that it has been established by research that obesity and inactivity stand almost on the same scale between cancer survivors of Canada and the rest of Canadians. According to the research findings of Dr. Kerry Courneya, Professor and Canada Research Chairperson at University of Alberta in Edmonton, and affiliated scientist of the Centre for Behavioral Research and Program Evaluation, based on studies of 114,000 adults in a 2005 Community Health Survey, the following facts were established. It was seen that, 21% of cancer survivors and 25% of general population of Canada were physically active, 18% of the cancer-recovered were obese while 15% of the general population was obese, an extra 34% of the cancer survivors were overweight, while the number of overweight general population was a 37%, almost half of the cancer survivors (about 53%) were overweight while again half (about 52%) of the Canadian population was overweight. The statistics show a striking comparison between the cancer affected and the general Canadians in terms of obesity and inactivity. This is not to alarm a non-cancerous Canadian that he/she runs a very high (lets say 100%) risk of being affected with cancer. It is just to caution Canadians and the rest of the global population in general that obesity and inactivity play havoc on one’s health. The normal people become vulnerable to a lot of deadly diseases – like hypertension, diabetes, coronary complications – other than cancer. Those who are lucky enough to survive cancer run a high risk of developing it once again if they do not take care of their physical activity levels. According to Dr. Kerry Courneya, the lifestyle of a person is a very important factor. One should always eat a healthy diet and exercise well to metabolize the diet and derive optimum energy from it. Heather Chappell, a Senior Manager of Cancer Control Policy at the Canadian Cancer Society opines that cancer has a profound negative effect on the patients as well as their families and this can be avoided by taking small steps in the direction of a healthy lifestyle. According to the researchers, a ‘physically active’ person is one who does an hour of walking a day, a ‘moderately active person’ is one who does about half an hour of walking a day and an ‘inactive person’ is one who walks for a lesser time than that. The research defined an obese person as having a BMI (body mass index) of a minimum of 30 and an overweight person having a BMI between 25 and 30. Image via: Medical News Today

Appearance does matter a lot! I wholly agree with this. How to look good and attractive is a million dollar question? Everybody wants to look smart and attractive. But, it demands a lot of patience and dedication. One needs to change his/her lifestyle which is not an easy task. In order to change your lifestyle and eating habits, one needs to do a lot of hard work. First thing to do is to plan your day. Here are a few interesting but significant steps that will change your world entirely. You must leave your bed early in the morning. Do exercise to make yourself fit and fine. 20 minutes of daily exercise would be worthwhile. Avoid skipping your breakfast, as this is the first meal after a long rest. You must have a satisfying and healthy breakfast, such as fresh fruit, high-fiber cereal and low fat milk. During your lunch, go for nutritious meal, such as fruit, low-fat yogurt, whole-wheat bread, homemade vegetable soup etc. If you start your day with a little planning, then there would be a little rush and everything would be smooth and fine! Chief dietitian for St. Barnabas Hospital in New York City, Milton Strokes said that, “If you leave exercise and healthy eating to chance, it’s not going to happen,” he further stated that, "You’re responsible for you. Use your personal digital assistant to set your day – gym time, dinner. Make these things pre-meditated – so it’s not like a surprise, you’ve got an extra hour, should you go to the gym or watch TV. If you don’t plan it, you won’t do it". Image:weightlossarticles Via:men.webmd