Tag: Obesity

Obesity

Obesity in Older Adults Linked to Risk of Falls?

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Michael Moore

Yes, according to a new study.

Obese older adults may be more likely than their thinner peers to suffer a potentially disabling fall — though the most severely overweight may be somewhat protected from injury, according to a U.S. study.

Falls are often seen as a problem for thin, frail older adults, since their bones are especially prone to fractures, but obesity carries its own risks, said researchers whose findings appeared in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

“People who are obese may have a harder time with balance,” said Christine Himes, of Syracuse University in New York, who worked on the study.

And when obese older adults lose their footing, they may be less able to react quickly and stop a fall, she added.

Looking at 10,755 people aged 65 and up, Himes and colleague Sandra Reynolds found that obese older adults were anywhere from 12 percent to 50 percent more likely to suffer a fall over two years than their normal-weight peers.

Another great reason to start the year off right and lose some body weight…..

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Health

The Study of Orangutans Deliver Insight Into Obesity of Homo Sapiens

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This is a very interesting study on obesity.

In lush times, orangutans on the island of Borneo gorge themselves on forest fruits, packing on extra pounds in preparation for leaner years, when they live off leaves and bark and their own stored fat.

This behavior of overeating is all too common in humans, but rarely seen in nonhuman primates, and studying it may offer some clues about obesity and eating disorders in people, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.

“Orangutans make very interesting models for studying human obesity because they are really the only apes and potentially the only nonhuman primates in the wild that actually store fat deposits,” said Erin Vogel, an evolutionary anthropologist from Rutgers University in New Jersey, whose study appears in the journal Biology Letters.

“It’s never been documented in any other species,” Vogel said in a telephone interview.

Now, if scientists can discover the biological basis for the fat saving behaviors and try to manipulate the biochemical expression…..

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Health

Poll Watch: American’s Weight Up Almost 20 Pounds Since 1990

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According to the latest Gallup Poll.

American men, on average, say they weigh 196 pounds and women say they weigh 160 pounds. Both figures are nearly 20 pounds higher than the average that men and women reported in 1990. As Americans’ actual weight has increased, so has their ideal weight.

Today, men on average say their ideal weight is 181 pounds and women say 138 pounds.

Men’s and women’s perceptions of their own ideal weight have generally increased over the same period that their self-reported actual weight has increased, although to a somewhat smaller degree. This means that not only do men and women report that they weigh more today versus 20 years ago, but they are also getting further away from their ideal weight.

Comparing the self-reports of actual and ideal weights, the average man weighs 15 pounds more than his ideal today, compared with 9 pounds in 1990. The average woman weighs 22 pounds more than her ideal today, compared with 13 pounds in 1990. The current figures for men and women are the highest Gallup has measured to date.

These results are based on Gallup’s annual Health and Healthcare survey, conducted Nov. 3-6. Gallup has asked Americans to say how much they weigh yearly since 2001 and in 1990 and 1999.

Subtracting men’s and women’s average self-reported weight from their average ideal weight reveals that 64% of men and 68% of women are currently over their ideal weight.

Certainly, not a good trend.

Not only are Americans more overweight and obese, they are in denial about it.

By the way, my weight has edged down another two pounds and I will be resetting my goals to reflect this study.

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Diet

Do Overweight People Eat LESS Often?

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Apparently yes according to a new study.

Overweight adults eat less often than people in the normal body weight range, but still take in more calories and are less active over the course of the day, according to a U.S. study. 

By contrast, normal weight adults, including those who had lost a lot of weight and kept it off, ate more often, according to findings published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association.

“Most of the research has shown that people who eat more frequently have a lower weight. But no one knows why,” said lead researcher Jessica Bachman, an assistant professor in the department of Nutrition and Dietetics at Marywood University in Scranton, Pennsylvania.

More than 60 percent of U.S. residents are obese or overweight, but the relationship between the number of meals people eat each day and the ability to maintain weight loss has remained unclear, she said.

I do know that when I weighed over 300 pounds I did not eat breakfast but would binge eat one or two times during the day. Whereas, today, when I weigh about 240 and want to lose an additional 50 pounds, I eat more often and measure the calories carefully.

The level of satiation is no different, although I do know now when I need some protein.

On average, the normal weight subjects ate three meals and a little over two snacks each day, whereas the overweight group averaged three meals and just over one snack a day.

Generally, though, weight loss “maintainers” consumed the fewest calories, at about 1,800 a day, compared with the normal weight and overweight subjects, who took in 1,900 and more than 2,000 calories a day, respectively.

Bachman said that snacking might help prevent weight gain by staving off intense hunger.

 

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Diet

America the Beautiful 2: The Thin Commandments

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A new documentary by Darryl Roberts that explores why we have an unhealthy obsession with dieting in America and who benefits from selling us the thin is healthy ideal.

What Darryl Roberts is saying is that rather than focusing on weight, Americans should be focusing on their health. Read this interesting interview by CNN.

First off, because [if] you are defining [obesity] by BMI, then it’s erroneous. So what we may have as a problem in this country is a health problem. That I agree with. We show it in the film. We have a health problem. And what we also show in the film is that health problems come to people with or without weight. So the film is making the point that we should be focusing on the health of people and not their weight.

Where we have problems is lifestyle choices. We have too many people eating fast food. We have too many people not exercising. We have too many people not engaging in healthy lifestyle behaviors. My point is if we have more people engaging in healthy lifestyle behaviors, we will become a healthier nation, whether we lose weight or not. If you think about it — it makes sense, right?

A very interesting perspective.

I have just returned from my annual physical examination and report while I have lost weight and am still considered obese, I am in excellent health.

But, do I wish to lose additional weight?

You bet, so that I can run farther and faster.

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