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May 19, 2015 By Hardika Vira Leave a Comment

Did you know about Syndrome X?

Syndrome X is also known as metabolic syndrome, cardio metabolic syndrome, insulin resistance syndrome, Reaven’s syndrome (named after Gerald Reaven an American endocrinologist and professor at Stanford University who has worked upon insulin resistance and diabetes), and CHAOS (in Australia). It’s one of the leading lifestyle related disorders.

As is defined by Wikipedia-Syndrome X is a disorder of energy utilization and storage, diagnosed by a co-occurrence of three out of five of the following medical conditions: abdominal (central) obesity, elevated blood pressure (Hypertension), elevated fasting plasma glucose (Diabetes/ insulin resistance), high serum triglycerides (hypertriglyceridemia), and low high-density cholesterol (HDL) levels.

In today’s times you will seldom find people with one single issue. You more often meet people with multiple issues for e.g.: You will see a person who is diabetic also has hypertension, and has a big belly at the same time. So, would you categorize this person as a diabetic or hypertensive or obese? Well, None of these! It is Metabolic Syndrome

How do you categorize a person suffering from metabolic syndrome?

He should have any of these 3 categories positive. As per American Heart Association(2004)

Elevated waist circumference:
- Men — greater than 40 inches (102 cm)
- Women — greater than 35 inches (88 cm)
Elevated triglycerides: Equal to or greater than 150 mg/dL (1.7 mmol/L)
Reduced HDL (“good”) cholesterol:
- Men — Less than 40 mg/dL (1.03 mmol/L)
- Women — Less than 50 mg/dL (1.29 mmol/L)
Elevated blood pressure: Equal to or greater than 130/85 mm Hg or use of medication for hypertension

Elevated fasting glucose: Equal to or greater than 100 mg/dL (5.6 mmol/L) or use of medication for hyperglycemia

Let us concentrate on the prevention part rather than treatment as we already know prevention is better than cure. The prevention for Metabolic Syndrome is same as its treatment.

Exercise daily for 30-60 minutes. Exercising increases the insulin sensitivity, helps reduce waist circumference, manages blood pressure and also improve HDL cholesterol. Exercise daily / Being active whole day is the requirement
Lose weight if overweight. Nearing your IBW (Ideal Body Weight) helps to reduce the pressure exerted on the walls of the arteries to supply blood to all parts of the body. It also helps in better glucose uptake. Reducing even 10% of your body weight helps you control diabetes, blood pressure and weight
Eat healthy and keep a check on the portions – Include a good amount of fruits and veggies in your daily diet. They are rich in fiber, vitamins and minerals. Fiber helps in maintaining blood sugar levels, choose whole grains and their products over the refined ones, choose low fat dairy products and lean proteins over red meat as red meat is high in fats and sodium. Go easy on saturated fats and trans fats like butter, ghee, margarine, vanaspati ghee, bakery products. Restrict cholesterol consumption to less than 300 mg/ day. Generally non-veg foods contain cholesterol. Veg sources do not contain cholesterol. Make it a point to check the nutritional label of the packaged foodstuff that you pick for cholesterol and Sodium content.
Quit smoking and alcohol- Getting rid of your habits reduces the risk factor to a large extent by preventing damage to your organs. Alcohol raises triglyceride levels, helps increases belly fat and smoking induces chain reaction which destroys other organs too.
Reduce stress levels- Stress hormone cortisol is known to increase blood sugar levels and create a negative impact on your body as well. Practicing deep breathing exercises and getting involved into your hobbies / recreational activities help curb the stress levels

Practicing these would not only help you lower the risk factors but also help lower your medication.

May 4, 2015 By Dave Hellman 1 Comment

Autonomy + Motivation + Accountability = Wellness

Everyone knows the basics of healthy living. Eat a balanced diet. Exercise. Get a good night’s sleep. Not long ago, if you needed more guidance than that, you had to find an expert (books, physicians, etc.). They were the only ones with the tools and knowledge to help you. This was okay for people who had the time and resources to seek out that expertise but for most people it was a huge barrier. And when we’re looking to make changes in our behavior, barriers strip us of motivation.

Flash forward to the current day and we have a convergence of technologies that addresses some significant obstacles. These include:

Wearable Fitness Technology – Wristbands, watches, pendants, eyeglasses, and even clothing that can sense steps taken, quality of sleep, heart rate, and more.
Smartphone Apps – For detailed tracking of exercise, food and nutrients consumed, blood sugar level, etc.
Online Services – That were formerly only available to professionals such as genome testing, full lab panels and microbiome (gut bacteria) testing.
Internet of Things – Infrastructure that allows these technologies to talk with one another. Step on your scale and it updates the food diary on your smartphone tracker app with your weight.

The age of autonomy is here. No longer must we depend on experts to know where we stand health-wise. But is that enough? Apparently not. As noted in a previous post on this site, Rethink Wearable Tech…Fad or Future, despite the growing popularity of devices like Wearable Fitness Trackers, many people stop using them only a short time after they get them.

You see, technology hasn’t figured out when you need space and when you need a little nudge. It’s not very good at helping you explore why you’re stuck or why you sometimes regress. It does a bad job at changing and adapting with you. And, it doesn’t know how to link your goals for good health to your vision, your values. Technology is just clueless about motivation and accountability.

Enter the Health Coach. Health Coaches are the latest member of your wellness team. Unlike physicians whose role is to diagnose and prescribe, Health Coaches help you make the changes you want to make by stoking the fire you have within. And unlike Nutrition Counselors or Personal Trainers who hand over wellness plans and monitor compliance, Health Coaches partner with you to uncover the strategies that honor your values and lifestyle. They work with you to keep you accountable.

Health Coaches are experts in human behavioral change. They recognize that family, physicians, and employers may influence positive changes in health, but the real inspiration to move towards wellness has to come from you. Health coaches use a process that surfaces what is most important to you and links those values to the healthy behaviors and goals that matter most. This is where motivation comes from.

As you progress, your coach helps you create a plan to reach those goals. The emphasis on you is critical. The plan can’t be some cookie cutter nutrition or exercise program that the coach pulls from some file. It must be a customized plan that strikes a balance between flexibility, because “stuff happens,” and specificity so you can link your plan to your progress. Without a tailored plan, it’s difficult to hold yourself accountable.

Health Coaching is a new field. Research on its impact is just emerging but initial results are encouraging. These include:

And all of these studies took place prior to and without the benefit of the technologies mentioned earlier. When we combine the ability for technology to collect data in a transparent way with the skills and knowledge of a professionally trained Health Coach, some magic starts to happen. Health Coaches know you as a person and can figure out when you need space and when you need a little nudge. Health Coaches excel at helping people explore why they’re stuck or why they sometimes regress. Health Coaches understand that wellness goals must change and adapt as you change and adapt. And Health coaches know how to link your goals for good health to your vision, your values.

Technology provides you autonomy. Health Coaches honor that autonomy, inspire motivation, and maximize accountability. And this combination results in a happy, healthy, and productive life.

April 27, 2015 By Shimpli Patil 38 Comments

Should we brisk walk before the meal or after?

As an adolescent, I was a victim of this common misconception that brisk walking immediately post meal helps burn calories. It’s quite natural to think that once we eat a meal and walk it out quickly, it will burn the calories that we just consumed. But hey! For that food to get converted into calories it requires a long process, which is called nothing but digestion. Unless and until we don’t let the food to get digested thoroughly, are we going to burn the calories? Obviously not!

Brisk walking post meal is a not a very good idea. It may cause acid reflux, ingestion or stomach upset. The reason is very simple- after the meal, our digestion process is all ready to go. Digestive juices are released in the stomach and intestine. This is the time when the stomach and intestine need most blood supply to carry on this process smoothly. Hence, the blood flow needs to be directed to this area for better digestion. If we perform any vigorous activity as simple as brisk walking after the meal, the blood circulation gets directed to our extremities which compromises the blood flow to the core region of the body, thus hampering the digestive processes.

Working out especially post dinner not only affects our digestion but may also postpone our sleep time. Workouts are a stress buster. Our body experiences an endorphin rush (feel good factor) after a nice cardio/strengthening session. Once we are on an endorphin high, we feel extremely elated and energized which tends to delay our sleep.

So what’s best for us? It’s always best to go for a brisk walk or any other workout before the meal (30 minutes prior or so). It exhausts our body’s energy stores which is then all set to fill up the stores again with a good meal. This reduces the chances of fat conversion during the meal as whatever we consume is utilized by the body cells for energy which leaves least for fat storage. In short, a pre meal workout fires up our body’s metabolism which therefore ensures better burn up of calories after we consume and digest the meal.

A similar point was proven by a 2006 study published in “Applied Physiology, Nutrition and Metabolism,” which says that people who walked prior to putting any food in their stomach and who walked hard enough to perspire burnt more fat than those who walked after eating.

Thus, it’s quite clear that in order to reap most benefits of brisk walking or other workouts, we need to schedule it prior to our meal. However, we can certainly go for a leisurely walk post meal, but again, not immediately. We can go after a 45 minutes gap. That is just to get over the bloat of eating way too much or to give your muscles a good stretch and it’s anytime a better option than promoting fat deposition by lying on the sofa watching TV. But remember, this should be a short 10-15 minute walk and not a long one.

Now that we have blown away the misconceptions, let’s implement the right thing and experience the change! Let’s Rock the pre-meal walk!

March 24, 2015 By CHARMI GOGRI 8 Comments

Know the science behind acidic and alkaline foods

pH balance in the body is extremely important in fact it is a matter of life and death if its imbalanced. The only people who don’t consider this alkaline/acidity balance as vital for better health are ignorant and pop in a pharmaceutical pill for every illness and bug in the body.

pH stands for power of hydrogen, which is a measurement of the hydrogen ion concentration in the body. The total pH scale ranges from 1 to 14, with 7 considered to be neutral. A pH less than 7 is said to be acidic and a pH greater than 7 are basic or alkaline. Human blood pH should be slightly alkaline ( 7.35 – 7.45 ).

An acidic pH in the body can occur from, an acid forming diet, emotional stress, toxic overload or any process that deprives the cells of oxygen and other nutrients. The body will try to compensate for acidic pH by using alkaline minerals. If the diet does not contain enough minerals to compensate, a buildup of acids in the cells will occur. This when combined with an arena of other challenging environmental factors (such as lack of rest, psychological stress, and pharmaceutical drugs) will lead to chronic, degenerative illnesses or otherwise deadly conditions sooner or later for which modern medicine can’t claim 100% cure.

Acidic environment will decrease body’s ability to repair damaged cells, decrease its ability to detoxify heavy metals, make tumor cells thrive, and make it more susceptible to fatigue and illness. The reason acidosis is more common in today’s society is due to the drastic changes in the eating patterns as compared to our ancestors. Our food today is far too high in acid producing animal products like meat, eggs and dairy, and far too low in alkaline producing foods like fresh vegetables. Additionally, we eat acid producing processed foods like white flour and sugar and drink acid producing beverages like coffee and soft drinks.

We use too many drugs (for quick fixes), which are acid forming too. Chemical or artificial sweetners are extremely acid forming. On the other hand eating too many alkalizing foods can lead to its own fair share of complications over time, but the risk of this is seemingly less likely considering the current sorry state of today’s highly addictive people’s faulty diet as well as lifestyle.

One of the best things we can do to correct an acidic body is to clean up the diet and lifestyle. In order to maintain optimal health, the diet should consist of 60% alkaline forming foods and 40% acid forming foods. To restore health and reverse the damage caused by acidic body, the diet should consist of 80% alkaline forming foods and 20% acid forming foods.

A small explanation to make you understand things better, when a person ingests food to fuel the body, the digestive and metabolic process of the body breaks food into a kind of ash which is either acidic or alkaline. The laws of modern biochemistry further explains that it is not the organic matter (such as Carbohydrates, Proteins and Fat) of foods (whether the food itself is acidic or alkaline), but their inorganic matter (such as calcium, magnesium, potassium, sodium, sulfur, phosphorous; that is, how they break down in our bodies), that determines either the acidity or alkalinity of this ashy residue.

All foods in nature contain both acid and alkaline-forming elements, pH balance is either achieved or thwarted as a direct result of the foods we choose to eat. Broadly speaking alkaline foods includes most fruits, green vegetables, peas, beans, lentils, spices, herbs and seasonings as well as seeds and nuts. And, acid forming foods includes meat, fish, poultry, eggs, grains, and legumes along with all the processed commercial refined foods off course!

Here is the quick list of foods based on their alkalinity and acidity, Have a look at them and follow the tips attached beneath that to make your diets more alkaline.

Source: energiserforlife.com

Tips :

Cut out sugar completely. Avoid processed sugars as well – no corn syrup, no agave, no maltose, no aspartame (Check Food labels carefully)

Having fresh vegetable juices in the morning will oxidise the nutrients present in the veggies.

The regular practice of Yoga cleanses the acids from the joints and organs

Avoid toxic fats like trans fats. Less known fact about coconut oil is it’s not acidic like all other oils when used for frying. Using coconut oil for cooking is the best recommendation.

Stop using deodorants and creams. They have massive chemical load that makes body acidic, also they often suppress the body’s natural functions like sweating, which actually helps to eliminate acid, and pushes the acid back into the lymph nodes.

Stop drinking fluoridated tap water. Tap water is bad, don’t even use it for cooking. Use water from water filter for drinking and cooking purpose.

Highly alkalising foods- you can complement your meals with Wheat Grass, Lemon Grass, Apple cider Vinegar, Alfalfa Grass, Kamut Grass, Oat Grass, Broccoli, Kelp, Cayenne, Cucumber (best taken in the morning or lunch, not at night)

Cut right down on meat. Meat is very acidic. Especially red meat.

Above all, the ultimate goal is balance. What you eat and drink will impact our body’s pH. So eat wisely.

Did you know about Syndrome X?

Autonomy + Motivation + Accountability = Wellness

Should we brisk walk before the meal or after?

Know the science behind acidic and alkaline foods

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