Feb2013_HEALTHY WEIGHT

A healthy body weight and healthy lifestyle is something that everyone tries to work towards.  Both of these are hard to achieve in todays frantic lifestyle.  This is seen in the fact that today Australia is ranked as one of the fattest nations in the developed world. 

The prevalence of obesity in Australia has more than doubled in the past 20 years; now more than fourteen million Aussies are overweight or obese.  Obesity has now overtaken smoking as the leading cause of premature death and illness in Australia

Carrying too much body fat can lead to a plethora of health problems and consequences including musculo-skeletal problems, cardiovascular disease, some cancers, sleep apnoea, type 2 diabetes, and hypertension just to name a few.  All of these conditions can have a serious impact on your quality of life, but more importantly, they will all reduce its length.  A Body Mass Index (BMI) of >25 is classed as overweight and >30 is obese and while this index has it flaws, it is widely accepted as the standard for measurement.

The upside to this is that just dropping some of the kilos can reduce much of the problems associated with being overweight or obese.  Your blood pressure will drop and your cholesterol will drop.  Some people have even reversed their diagnosis of diabetes.  All the risk factors associated with these problems will slide down the closer you get to a healthy weight

There are hundreds if not thousands of things out there to help you do this, from liquid diets to Ab smasher Pro’s.  Unfortunately the truth is really boring, it comes down to one simple rule, energy in is less than energy out.  

Healthy weight loss should never be consistently more than ½ – 1 kg per week unless under medical supervision, so this will be a slow process.  However this way will increase the chance of keeping the weight off for good.

Diet and exercise is another way to put it.  I’m not going to go into it too much as there is too much to say but in summary, even though diet is a much bigger component of weight loss than exercise, both are important.  Regular physical activity reduces cardiovascular risk in its own right and also improves levels of cardiovascular risk factors such as being overweight, high blood pressure, and Type 2 diabetes.  The heart foundation recommends at least 30 minutes of moderate intensity physical activity on most, if not all days of the week. So combining some smarter food choices and a higher activity level WILL lead to a healthier life.

Don’t forget, all of this information is given with the knowledge that if you want to make a change, or you just want some more information, make sure to see a health care professional.

Written by Andrew Harvey

(Your local pharmacist) 

Dayboro Pharmacy 

Phone 3425 1435

Mon – Fri 8.30am – 5.30pm

Sat 8.30am – 12.30pm