The most common bread sold and consumed by the American public is by far white bread.

We have all grown up eating our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on white bread and our morning toast on white bread, but why?

Most likely because it’s cheaper and lasts longer then any other style bread. The issue I bring up though is it’s nutritional value, which is close to none.

When a producer has wheat refined into white flour about 25 known nutrients are removed. However after the refining process only about 4 are replaced. On average 87 percent of essential minerals are lost.

The funny thing is that the producer will put “enriched with vitamins and minerals” to give it a healthy appeal. The same procedure is used in making most pasta’s, white rice, and white sugar.

This all boils down to the fact that we are consuming two thirds of our diet on refined empty calories. This is a main culprit with low energy, obesity, low mineral intake and unstable insulin levels.

The solution is to consume whole wheat breads and pasta, brown rice, and limit refined products. You not only will see countless health benefits, but the taste improvement will be extraordinary. Give it a try and experiment with different foods that are closer to what nature intended and not what the food corporations wanted.

Although many people know the health risks that come with obesity, new research finds that it may increase the risk of cancer.

According to a study published in the journal Cell, obesity can lead to an increased risk of liver cancer. Researchers believe if they could curb obesity, they may be able to reduce cancer deaths by as many as 90,000 a year.

The study reveals that obese people have a 4.5-fold greater risk for developing liver cancer and a 1.5-fold greater risk of overall cancers.

Researchers believe that physicians spend too much time focusing on other obesity risks such as type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

“Doctors always worry about our weight, but the focus is often on cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes, both of which can be managed pretty well with existing drugs,” said researcher Michael Karin. “However, we should also worry about elevated cancer risk.”

For people who are worried about their extra pounds, adopting an alkaline diet of fruits, vegetables and whole grains may help control weight gain.

Diet and lifestyle are among the various factors that can contribute to hypertension, along with age, sex, genetics and stress. In addition to stopping smoking and exercising regularly, the following dietary advice is appropriate:

Reduce salt intake – There is evidence that high sodium intake increases the risk of hypertension and that reducing salt intake may reduce risk.

However, the influence of salt on blood pressure may be smaller than that of obesity or alcohol. Salt restriction has more effect in older people and in those with higher initial blood pressure.
The UK recommendation is that the average adult sodium intake should fall by one-third (ie, from the current level of 9g/day to 6g/day). This can be achieved by cutting down on salt added during cooking or at the table. However, two-thirds of sodium is derived from processed foods (eg, pies, breakfast cereals, bread, canned soups, sausages, corned beef, savoury snacks), cheese, bacon and ham. Most fresh food contains little salt and should be recommended.

Increase potassium intake – An increased potassium intake may be protective because potassium is a metabolic counterbalance to sodium. Potassium is found in fresh fruit and vegetables, especially in bananas, blackcurrants, rhubarb, apricots, dried fruit, fruit juice, mushrooms and spinach. It is also in baked beans.

Avoid obesity and overweight – Obesity is a major determinant of hypertension, and weight reduction is an important part of its management.

Keep alcohol intake within sensible limits – There is a strong link between high alcohol intake (eg, >30 units/week) and hypertension. Alcohol intake should be limited to a maximum of two to three units/day. (One unit is equivalent to a glass of wine, a single measure of spirits or half a pint of ordinary strength beer, lager or cider.) Intake should be spread evenly through the week and binge drinking avoided. A large amount of alcohol in the evening may raise blood pressure significantly the following day.

Nevertheless, there are still plenty of reasons to avoid too much sedentary “screen time,” Dr. Ulf Ekelund of the MRC Epidemiology Unit in Cambridge, UK and colleagues say, given potential negatives including “violence and aggressive behavior, poor academic performance, and poor body image.”

To help tease out the role of time spent in different types of activity in making children fat, independent of screen time and otherwise being a couch potato, Ekelund and his team looked at 1,862 children 9 to 10 years old, 23 percent of whom were overweight or obese.

Using a wristwatch-like device to measure the amount and intensity of activity children got throughout the day, the researchers looked for associations between this activity and children’s waist size, amount of body fat, and body mass index (BMI). Kids also reported how much time they spent watching TV or using a computer.

Sixty-nine percent of the children were getting at least an hour of moderate physical activity a day, while 58 percent reported having less than two hours of screen time daily.

While children who spent more time not moving had bigger waists and a larger percentage of body fat, much of this relationship could be attributed to the fact that they spent less time engaging in moderate physical activity.

But the time children spent engaging in vigorous activity, and their combined moderate activity-vigorous activity time, had the strongest ties to waist circumference and fat mass.

For instance, every 6.5 minutes a child spent doing vigorous activity like playing ball, bicycling, or running around outside was associated with a 1.32-centimeter reduction in waist size, the researchers found. But 13.6 minutes of moderate physical activity only reduced waist size by half a centimeter.

Based on the findings, the researchers say, children should still be encouraged to limit their sedentary time, but this alone won’t be enough to tackle childhood obesity.

“Interventions may therefore need to incorporate higher intensity-based activities to curb the growing obesity epidemic,” they conclude.

Boys in the study got an average of a half-hour of vigorous activity each day, while girls got 22 minutes. “There is no clear cut answer” as to how much vigorous activity is optimal, Ekelund noted in an email to Reuters Health.

“For most health outcomes, the more activity you do the better.” But, he added, people who do lots of strenuous activity may still put on too much weight if they take in too many calories.

The team is converting the starch-like substance called gellan gum into a liquid which can be drunk but then turns to a gel when it reacts with the digestive juices in the stomach.

The substance, which contains virtually no calories, then slowly breaks down in around six hours.

By adding nutrients, the researchers believe they can make a drink that not only fills you up with no calories but is also healthy.

Dr Fotis Spyropoulos of the School of Chemical Engineering at Birmingham University, said: “We think it is a great idea because it is so simple.

“The solution we designed takes advantage of the body’s natural process of digestion to convert itself into a gel that fills you up and then breaks down.

“We are now working on how to get it to release energy slowly so that it not only makes the stomach feel full but also provides energy the body needs.”

The solution, which the researchers will be available for industry testing in three years, works by reacting with the acid in the stomach’s digestive juices and turning itself into a gel.

However, once it has turned into a gel it then starts breaking down just like a meal.

The strength of this gel is carefully controlled so it is firm enough to provide a prolonged sense of fullness but then breaks down at a rate similar to food.

While it “sits” in the stomach, it suppresses appetite, making the consumer feel full for longer, reducing the likelihood of snacking and eating unhealthy foods.

The scientists have designed other mechanisms into the technology to get the gel structure to progressively weaken after a certain time of exposure to the stomach’s acid, and eventually break down and pass through the digestive tract.

The researchers’ aim is to see the new solution in a breakfast drink or a type of porridge, the consumer benefiting from feeling full, but still able to eat three meals a day.

Parent’s have an important role to play in the case of obese children. Children learn from their parents. Parents should be an example to them by displaying discipline, being physically active, taking part in games with them, encouraging them to go out and play, eat a healthy diet, avoid eating fast foods.

Great  number of children growing in the United States are obese. How can parents keep their kids from becoming obese without triggering an eating disorder, particularly in young girls?

Walk the talk. Without question, the best way to prevent or treat obesity in children is for parents to set the example themselves—eating healthfully and increasing physical activity. Parents must focus on healthful behaviors, not weight or looks.

Teach the 80/20 concept: Make healthful choices 80 percent of the time and treat yourself 20 percent of the time. While caloric reduction is mandatory, deprivation and rigid restrictions of food do not work as a healthful long-term strategy for children.

Here are some additional recommendations to prevent obesity and inactivity in children:

• Target for no more than a 2-pound weight loss per week, and work toward a target weight that is in the lower 85 percent BMI range for the child’s age and gender.

• Consume at least three to five servings of fruits and vegetables per day.

• Allow no more than one hour of television or computer games per day.

• Exercise either individually or in a group activity for one hour at least five days per week.

If the whole family incorporates subtle evolutionary—not revolutionary—changes, everyone will benefit from a healthful environment at home.

Walter Willett, who chairs the nutrition department at the Harvard School of Public Health, argues that there is a “direct causal link” between sugar-sweetened soft drinks and energy drinks and obesity, which is in turn linked to heart disease, some types of cancer, arthritis, and type 2 diabetes.

So he and a colleague, Lilian Cheung, a lecturer in the nutrition department, are suggesting that we all start focusing on drinks with a far lower sugar and calorie content: things like water, tea, seltzer with a splash of juice, and coffee with one lump of sugar. They call on beverage makers to create reduced-calorie beverages with no more than 1 gram of sugar per ounce, without using noncaloric sweeteners like aspartame and stevia.

[See why VitaminWater is a poster child for the importance of reading food and drink labels.]

That kind of beverage would have about 3 teaspoons of sugar per 12 ounces and about 50 calories. Look at Harvard’s chart to see how soft drinks, juices, and sports drinks stack up next to that standard—the worst offender, cranberry juice cocktail, has 200 calories and 12 teaspoons of sugar in a 12-ounce serving. (No word yet on how the beverage industry trade group has received this suggestion, but I will write a post if it does respond.)

[Here's the skinny on caloric sweeteners like agave and corn syrup.]

Why the fuss over sugary beverages rather than, say, candy bars? Willett and Cheung say that these drinks are the largest source of added sugar in the diet of young Americans, with teen boys drinking more than a quart per day. In addition, other researchers, such as Barry Popkin, have suggested that liquid calories don’t prompt our bodies to feel full the way calories in solid form do.

The Harvard folks say we need to retrain our bodies away from intense sweetness, which is why their hypothesized beverages don’t include low-calorie sweeteners like stevia, either. “When adults get conditioned to everything being sweet, it’s hard to appreciate the gentle sweetness of a carrot or an apple,” says Willett. That means using even low-calorie sweeteners may lead to weight gain, he says. (Or it may not: A study published last year suggesting low-calorie sweeteners led to overeating was done in rats, not people.)

As I’ve written before, whether or not you buy the idea that sugary soft drinks and energy drinks are any worse than sugar in solid form, cutting them out may be an easy way to lose weight. Harvard suggests alternatives including low-sodium miso soup, infused waters, and homemade fresh fruit coolers. If you’re not willing to give up your soda habit and are trying to lose weight, at least be aware of the calories and sugar the drinks are adding to your diet, and make up for that by paring back elsewhere.

Obesity promotes not only severe pregnancy complications in the mother, it also places the baby at high risk of health problems, including an increased chance of neonatal death.

That’s the sobering news from a group of Swedish researchers who say that not only is it important to control weight gain during pregnancy, but to also get your level of body fat under control before you attempt to conceive.

“[We are hopeful] that knowing the problems concerning pregnancy and delivery associated with obesity could possibly motivate young women to prevent excessive weight gain,” says study author Dr. Marie Cendergren. She is an obstetrician in the division of obstetrics and gynecology at Linkoping University, where the research was conducted.

The findings appear in the February issue of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Although Cendergren believes that reaching as close to a “normal” weight as possible before conception is the best way to avoid problems, she acknowledges this would be difficult for most women suffering from obesity.

However she adds that “a BMI below 30 significantly reduces risks,” and she encourages women to aim for that goal. A BMI, or body mass index, is an indication of the level of body fat. A “normal” BMI ranges from 19 to 26, depending on height, Cendergren says.

Among the pregnancy problems cited by the study was an increased risk of preeclampsia, a potentially fatal form of maternal high blood pressure. Other problems include increased likelihood of Caesarean-section delivery; greater risk of shoulder dystocia (damage to the baby’s arm and shoulder during delivery); fetal distress; stillbirth; and death of the child shortly after birth.

Although losing weight before pregnancy would help reduce the risk of all these problems, Cendergren suggests that for even greater insurance, all obese women should be under the care of a high-risk pregnancy expert.

“We must look upon these pregnancies and deliveries as high-risk pregnancies — particularly the doctors dealing with them,” Cendergren says.

New York University obstetrician Dr. Michael Silverstein says the study underscores the importance of watching your weight both before and after pregnancy. But, he adds, this is information most physicians have known for a long time.

“Whether the weight gain occurs before pregnancy or after conception takes place, if you are very overweight it is going to cause a litany of problems affecting both the mother and the baby,” Silverstein says. Even something as routine as a pregnancy ultrasound — to check for fetal growth and development — can be difficult or impossible to accurately read when the mother is very overweight.

“I’m not certain if the excess weight is causing these birthing complications, or if the weight is keeping us from properly diagnosing certain conditions that we might otherwise normally see — particularly those involving fetal distress,” Silverstein says.

While he agrees that some obese women do require the care of a high-risk pregnancy expert, he also believes every pregnancy should be viewed in an individual light.

“A lot depends on the overall health of the mother. A very overweight woman who is in good physical condition may be of less concern than a woman who is moderately overweight but is in poor physical condition or is carrying more than one baby,” he says.

The Swedish study looked at nearly 3,500 pregnancies in morbidly obese women — defined as a body mass index over 40. An additional 12,698 women with a BMI between 35.1 and 40 were also part of the study. All were compared to pregnant women with a normal BMI, falling between 19.8 and 26.

The result: Women with a BMI greater than 40 were at significantly heightened risk for preeclampsia; stillbirth; Caesarean delivery; instrument delivery, (such as forceps); shoulder dystocia; meconium aspiration (a newborn breathing-related procedure), fetal distress; early neonatal death; and large-for-gestational-age — a problem that can lead to other birth complications.

Although women with a BMI between 35.1 and 40 also were subjected to the same risks, the incidence was notably lower. Indeed, researchers say the lower a woman’s BMI, even by just a few points, the lower her risk of problems.

According to Cendergren, the risk of gaining excessive amounts of weight during pregnancy is as detrimental as being very overweight going into the pregnancy.

As far as your health goes, avoiding an excessive amount of body fat is the best way to lower your risk from heart disease, hypertension, diabetes and even from developing gall bladder disease.

Is the body mass index (BMI) the best measure of how much fat is in my body?

Body mass index, BMI, is only an indirect measurement of body fat. For scientific research purposes there are more accurate methods of measuring what percent of a body’s weight is composed of fat such as hydrodensitometry (underwater weighing) and dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry.

Physical measurements such as waist and hip circumferences and skin fold thickness in the back of the elbow are also used.

The BMI happens to be the most commonly used measurement in epidemiologic studies and for middle-aged men and women, it correlates over 90% with fat mass densitometry. For older adults who tend to have less muscle mass proportionally, it loses some of its accuracy as an absolute measurement. The BMI is also called the Quetelet index and is calculated by the weight in kilograms divided by the square of the height in meters. While it does not distinguish fat mass from lean or muscle mass, it is a very useful approximation to what one should weigh depending on height.
What are the health complications of obesity?

In order to determine what people should weigh, researchers have looked at risk of death by different BMI categories in order to determine what would be ideal. Keep in mind that excess weight can have health-associated problems that do not result for quite a while. It can make arthritis or low back problems worse, cause diabetes and gall bladder disease. Risk of Type II diabetes (usually adult onset) rises in women at a BMI of over 22 even though the normal range for BMI is 19-25. Deaths from cardiovascular disease in non-smoking women rises slightly at a BMI of 22-25 but takes a dramatic jump at a BMI of over 30. Each kilogram (2.2 lbs) of weight loss will reduce systolic blood pressure (the first number) by .43 mm Hg and diastolic blood pressure (the second or bottom number) by .33 mm HG in women who have hypertension.

Certain cancers have also been associated with excess weight. Cancer of the gall bladder, breast, uterus and ovaries are more common in obese women and weight loss seems to significantly reduce these risks. Obesity is also a risk factor in for osteoarthritis which is the condition responsible for more than 70% of hip and knee replacements. In overweight individuals weight loss of an average of 11 lbs (5 kg) reduced the risk of developing osteoarthritis by more than 50%.

BMIs of 28-30 have a 2.4 times risk of infertility and ovulatory disorders compared to women with a BMI of 20-22. Excess hair growth and acne can also be associated with increased weight and disappear with weight loss.

What is the definition of overweight or obesity?

While BMI is not the perfect measurement for assessing increased body fat, it is the most easily obtained measurement that has a high correlation with percent of body fat so most of the standards are set using BMI. Even though there can be some increased health risks within the upper limits of the normal range, various groups such as the World Health Organization, the American Institute of Nutrition and the International Obesity task force, among others have given some guidelines.

Weight Category Definitions

You may calculate your body mass index in pounds or kilograms or look up on the table where your current BMI puts you.

I will never get to my ideal weight — why even try?

It can be extremely difficult for an obese person to lose weight down to an ideal level. Fortunately many studies show a huge reduction in mortality and weight related problems with even a modest reduction of 5-10% weight loss which is maintained for at least a year. In fact, losing large amounts of weight does not lower the mortality further than just a 10% weight loss does. Nurses who lost 11 kg (24 lbs) had a risk of type 2 diabetes that was 75% lower than nurses with unchanged weight. Thus the overall goal should be weight loss but not necessarily all the way to ideal body weight. A 10% loss occurring at a rate of 1-2 lbs per week is what most weight management specialists recommend.
When should diet pills be considered in the management of weight problems?

Various prescription medicines that aid in weight loss have come on and off the market over many years. Some have had dangerous side effects only discovered after years of use. Most have only a temporary effect on aiding weight loss. As each newer medicine comes available promising effortless weight loss, weight management experts still prefer non medication aided dieting and behavioral modification. There are circumstances in which the experts resort to medicines.

• individuals with a BMI of over 30 and who have serious health complications
• individuals with appetite problems to the extent that a women reports she is always thinking of food or has constant food cravings
• more than one or two failures at weight loss or maintenance of weight loss using behavioral therapy

Surgical bypass therapy should be considered for women who have BMIs of 40 or over 35 with obesity health complications.

A growing number of children in the United States are obese. How can parents keep their kids from becoming obese without triggering an eating disorder, particularly in young girls?

Walk the talk. Without question, the best way to prevent or treat obesity in children is for parents to set the example themselves—eating healthfully and increasing physical activity. Parents must focus on healthful behaviors, not weight or looks. Teach the 80/20 concept: Make healthful choices 80 percent of the time and treat yourself 20 percent of the time. While caloric reduction is mandatory, deprivation and rigid restrictions of food do not work as a healthful long-term strategy for children.