Way too frequently people spend weeks losing weight, just to reach their goal, stop the diet, and then gradually regain the weight. It’s a terrible cycle to be stuck in.

A study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that individuals who successfully lost weight AND kept the weight off altered their principles after losing weight.

This was a telephone survey of 1165 adult who had successfully lost weight with some maintaining the weight loss. Researchers took the data and compiled a list of 36 behaviors at least 10% of the surveyed adults adapted.

Weight loss was defined as losing 10% or more body weight during the previous 12 months. So for a 200 pound individual this would equal a weight loss of 20 pounds.

Maintenance was defined as losing 10% or more body weight during the previous 12 months and keeping it off for one year or more.

How They Lost the Weight

Continue reading ‘The Right Mindset for Weight Loss’ »

There are a variety of factors that impact your success losing weight. The results of a recent long term study shed light on the impact your food choices and lifestyle choices have on weight gain.

The Study

This study included 120,877 women and men participants who were followed for 12 to 20 years. Relationships between diet, lifestyle, and weight changes were examined.

The Results

Continue reading ‘Losing Weight Involves More Than Simply ‘Eat Less, Exercise More’’ »

If you had a heart attack do you think you’d ‘clean up’ your dietary habits to prevent a future heart attack? Surprisingly most people do not.

Continue reading ‘Fast Food – Have you decreased your intake?’ »

Did you know when you diet you are frequently sacrificing vitamins and minerals?

When you diet, you don’t just cut calories, you also reduce your intake of vitamins and minerals.

Standford University researchers evaluated the effects of different diets (Atkins, Zone, LEARN, and Ornish) of 300 overweight and obese women. The women reduced their daily caloric intake by 500 calories and all women reduced their overall vitamin and mineral intakes. Vitamin E was reduced the most – 65%.

Researchers were surprised to note that women following the Zone diet actually saw an increase in vitamin A, E, and K intake and no reduction in other nutrients.

When losing weight it’s important to not compromise your overall health. The best bet is a balanced weight loss plan you can stick with long term.

All the best,
Lisa Nelson RD
http://lisanelsonrd.com

Here’s a few details on how the Health Care Reform Bill impacts Medicaid from a nutrition standpoint.

Medicaid

A 5 year grant will be established to provide incentives for implementing a healthy lifestyle. This includes weight loss, cholesterol reduction, diabetes prevention, and diabetes management. The grant will cover preventive services that are recommended by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force and will eliminate cost sharing for prevention services. The grant won’t be effective until January 1, 2011. (FYI – The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force is established with the passing of the bill into law.)

Continue reading ‘Health Care Reform Bill – Medicaid Changes’ »

High blood pressure is a serious condition that requires treatment. Here are answers to four frequently asked questions you need to know.

What is high blood pressure?

Blood pressure equals the force pushing against your artery walls when your heart beats and when it rests. The systolic pressure is the force against artery walls when your heart beats (contracts), while the diastolic pressure is the pressure against your artery walls when the heart relaxes (between beats).

High blood pressure is a reading equal to or greater than 140/90 mm Hg. A reading between 120-139/80-89 mm Hg falls within the pre-hypertension category. A blood pressure below 120/80 mm Hg is considered normal. High blood pressure is typically diagnosed after more than one elevated blood pressure reading.

Why is high blood pressure dangerous?

Continue reading ‘High Blood Pressure – 4 Frequently Asked Questions’ »

Have many diets have you tried . . . and failed? Are you ready to stop the dieting roller coaster and gain control of what makes you overeat?

Emotional eating is one of the major causes of overeating, weight gain, and weight regain and one that many traditional weight loss plans and diets fail to address. For many smart, busy women, it’s the root of their overeating problem.

Next week at the Virtual Health Retreat, Dr. Melissa McCreery will explain what emotional eating is, what you need to know about it, and how to prevent it from sabotaging your weight loss plans. She’ll also tell you the steps you can take to take control of your eating and begin to create effective and lasting change in your health and make peace with food.

Here’s a little of what she’ll be covering . . .

• Why diets don’t work and the missing ingredient you need to be effective
• How to identify what you are really craving (if you are overeating, you MUST break this cycle!)
• How to create your own customized blueprint for making peace with food-once and for all

Continue reading ‘3 Tips to Stop Emotional Eating (Before it Sabotages Your Next Weight Loss Plan!)’ »

The poor quality of the typical American diet has lead to rampant nutritional deficiencies related to hypertension, heart disease, atherosclerosis, heart attacks, strokes, heart failure, renal disease, diabetes, and obesity.

High blood pressure is due to a combination of genetics and your environment/lifestyle. Nutrients, including macronutrients (carbohydrates, protein, fat) and micronutrients (vitamins, minerals) play a central role when it comes to maintaining a healthy blood pressure as well as minimizing organ damage linked to high blood pressure. Balancing the nutrients in your diet for optimal nutrition dramatically impacts the prevention and treatment of high blood pressure. To effectively treat high blood pressure it is recommended you have a functional intracellular assessments.

What is a Functional Intracellular Assessment?

Continue reading ‘Lower High Blood Pressure with a Combo Approach’ »

Aging throws some hurdles into your heart health and weight loss plans. For one your metabolism drops every decade as you age. Here are some mistakes to avoid if you want to see success:

1. Eating the same way you did 10-20 years ago.

Your metabolism (the rate you burn calories) decreases about 2% every 10 years beginning at age 30. If you continue to eat the same amount year after year you will gain weight.

2. Skipping meals.

May temporarily “save calories”, but you’ll quickly replace the calories as hunger leads you to overindulge at the next meal. Skipping meals can also cause your metabolism to slow down.

3. Jumping from fad diet to fad diet.

Fad diet should be synonymous with “bad diet”. There’s no research to back up the claims that eliminating this food or adding that one will cause you to lose weight. Nor will eating at only certain times of the day give you the long term results you seek.

4. Keeping unhealthy snacks within reach.

If you only have potato chips and sweets in your cupboards you are not setting yourself up for success. You must keep fruits and vegetables and healthy high fiber snacks on hand if you are to be expected to include more in your diet.

What are some of your habits that are sabotaging your success? I’d love to hear them. Share as a comment below.

Here’s a link to 1-A-Week Weight Loss Tips – http://www.weightlosswithlisa.com.

All the best,
Lisa Nelson RD
Best Weight Loss Plan
http://www.bestweightlossplan.org

Let me state right up front that I do not recommend following a low carb diet. That being said I want to share some of the latest research with you.

A study published on January 25, 2010 in the Archives of Internal Medicine compared a low carb diet versus a low fat plus orlistat diet. Researchers analyzed the effect of these two diets on weight loss and blood pressure.

Just in case you don’t know, orlistat is also known by the names Xenical and Alli.

Researchers studied 146 participants from the Department of Veterans Affairs primary care clinics in Durham, North Carolina. Participants were randomly assigned to either the low carb of the low fat plus orlistat diet, received instructions, and were monitored for 48 weeks. Some factors analyzed included body weight, blood pressure, fasting serum lipid, and glycemic parameters.

Results of the study found weight loss to be similar between the two groups at ~9% body weight. The low carbohydrate diet resulted in a lower blood pressure for participants when compared to the low fat diet with orlistat. The low carb diet lowered systolic (top number) blood pressure on average 5.9 mm Hg and diastolic (bottom number) blood pressure 4.5 mm Hg.

HDL Cholesterol and triglyceride levels improved for individuals on each diet, while LDL cholesterol improved only for those on the low fat plus orlistat diet. Glycemic parameters, such as glucose, insulin, and hemoglobin A1C only improved for low carbohydrate diet participants. Although it’s worth noting that the difference between groups was not statistically significant.

Like I said at the beginning I do not recommend a low carb diet. My first choice to promote a lower blood pressure would be the DASH diet. A study on the DASH diet was actually published in this same journal issue.

The DASH Diet alone was compared to the DASH diet in combination with a weight management and exercise plan. The DASH Diet when combined with an exercise/weight management plan resulted in an 11.2 mm Hg drop of systolic blood pressure and an average weight loss of 19 pounds over a 4 month period.

The main thing to remember is that you need to pick a plan you can stick with for the long term. Steady, consistent action is what will lead to results. If you haven’t already I encourage you to sign-up for the e-course 7 Natural Ways to Lower Blood Pressure at http://www.lowerbloodpressurewithlisa.com.

What do you think about using a low carb diet to lower blood pressure? Share your thoughts below.

All the best,
Lisa Nelson RD