"Discovering Healthy Families"

I know I talk about obesity a good bit, but like I've stated previously, bariatrics is what I'm really passionate about.  There was a recent article from the Journal of American Dietetics Association that takes about the establishment of a child and parent program that will help instill good nutritional values and the important of exercising as a family.  This new program will take place at the Discovery Center, a kid-friendly place where kids can have fun learning new things.  This program will provide families with a friendly website to access resources to help families begin this program.  Some of the resources will provide ways to include physical activity in the families everyday activities and ways to incorporate nutritional foods in meals by providing healthy recipes.  The program will also provide the family with a health coach to help with lifestyle changes.  Finally, at the Discovery Center, there will be a kiosk available to engage the family with hands-on activities to make it fun to learn new information about  nutrition.

I think that this program that has recently been established will be wonderful for families, especially the larger ones.  It is so crucial that families do these things together so they can lean on each other.  Plus, parents are responsible for their children's health until they are old enough to make their own choices.  If parents are conscious of what they are putting in their child's body, then they could potentially be setting them up for health problems down the road.  It's also crucial for parents to get involved with in activities with their children.  I know as a child, I was more prone to wanted to go outside and play if my parents went outside and played with me.  Even taking a family walk would be a step in the right direction.

I feel that this program is something that Americans need, given how people's health is these days.  It's about time that we start making changes.

Hot, Fresh Peanuts...Come Get Your Peanuts!!!

Who knew that flying in a plane could be so healthy? If you're anything like me, my favorite part of the plane ride is getting a bag of peanuts. A recent study on peanut consumption and cardiovascular risk found that the overall consumption of nuts reduces the risk of Coronary Artery Disease. Subjects in the study were instructed to consume their habitual diet in addition to peanuts equivalent to 20% of their mean energy intake in one day.

The study concludes that consuming peanuts in addition to your normal daily diet will actually increase your HDL-Cholesterol, which is the good cholestrol. The study goes further to find that pistachio nuts also had a similar affect on lipid (fat) levels. One surprising outcome though is that the subjects of the study actually found it difficult to consume their normal daily diet when also consuming peanuts. The study saw the consumption of both animal protein and carbohydrates decrease and these changes coincide with the dietary changes recommended to prevent Cardiovascular Disease and other chronic diseases.

If I weren’t a nutrition major I would probably find this article to be a bit surprising.  I'm sure most of us have heard the saying that we should eat a handful of nuts per day, but have you seen the fat grams on those things?  Even though they are high in fat, they are high in polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats, which are the good fats.   Since the fats are good fats, the subjects of the study showed no evidence of weight gain.

So next time you're at the baseball game and you open up your bag of peanuts, just remember that you made a healthy choice. Now that hot dog in your other hand...that's a different story.

Eating Habits of Parents Affecting Children

Even though my major is nutrition, I especially have a great interest in obesity.  Obesity among children really catches my attention, but obesity in general is is a topic that I have always been drawn to.

This week I read an article on how there is a relationship among a child's home food environment and their dietary patterns during their childhood/adolescent years.  The article draws a connection between the food the parents consume, what they serve at the table, and what is generally available in the household to consume.  If parents consumed healthy foods and kept healthy foods in the house, the child was more likely to consume more fruits, vegetables, and dairy instead of unhealthy foods.  Also, if the parents served a vegetable at the dinner table during meals, the child was more likely to eat that vegetable than refuse it.  These habits were being compared with families who didn't make a positive influence on the dietary intake of their children.  The difference comes into play when the child begins high school and they are no longer subjective to exactly what their parents make for them; they now will actually get a choice.  The adolescents who were exposed to positive influences as a child were more likely to choose healthy foods during lunch in high school than those parents who didn't make a positive influence on their children with the appropriate eating habits.  The article also states that children who had strict rules about eating, chose not to consume unhealthy foods, whereas the children who had more lenient parents, engaged in random, unhealthy eating.

Now, this article seems like it should be common sense, but for all parents this isn't.  From my experience so far, some parents think that making good habits as children doesn't matter.  Some say "Oh, I can work on that later and they'll listen because I'm the parent."  In reality, making a habit of something when the child is small is crucial, not only to their eating habits, for all the habits they pick up as they grow older. By making good eating habits as a child, the child is less likely to become overweight and obese, unlike those children who have poor eating habits.  This usually leads to obesity, which is the beginning of a downhill battle if the parents don't start doing something about it when their children are young.

Commissioned Document

I can already say that this blog isn't going to be as long as they have normally been because of a massive work load that just seemed to magically appear all in one day.  Anyways, we've now gotten into our project that will be lasting the rest of the semester basically.  I have to say that I'm kind of excited because the company that we are writing a document for is the company that I currently work for, and hopefully they will give me a full-time job once I graduate.  The company is Total Nutrition Technology and they deal with weight loss and changing bad habits to a lifestyle of healthy habits.  Also, the topic of our document is about nutrition which obviously interests me since that is my major and it won't be so dull throughout the semester when I'm working on it and I feel that I will put more effort into it since I will like doing the research.

That being said, who are you doing your commissioned document for and does it make you excited like it does me?