Why having a pot belly 'is a bigger heart risk than obesity'

Having a pot belly – even if you are not overweight – poses a greater risk of death from heart problems than being generally obese, warn doctors. A ‘spare tyre’ around the waist is uniquely dangerous because it is packed with ‘bad fat’, research shows. 

The US study found that those who were not overweight but had a bulging midriff were 2.75 times more at risk of dying from cardiovascular disease than normal weight and a proportionate waistline. They were also at 2.08 times the risk of dying prematurely from all causes. 

Most strikingly, people with a healthy overall weight but too much abdominal fat were even more likely to be heart victims than generally obese people, whose risk was 2.34 times more than those of normal weight with a regular waistline. Middle-aged spread – known as central obesity – is partly responsible for the development of heart disease and diabetes.

 Fat packed around the organs in the abdomen is more dangerous than fat on the hips because it’s ‘metabolically active’, releasing more of the inflammatory, toxic chemicals that raise heart disease risk. Many experts now want waist circumference or waist-to-hip ratio, which indicates levels of abdominal fat, adopted as a more accurate guide than body mass index (BMI), which relates weight to height.

 Dr Francisco Lopez-Jimenez, senior author on the study and a cardiologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, said: ‘We knew from previous research that central obesity is bad, but what is new in this research is that the distribution of the fat is very important even in people with a normal weight. 

‘This group has the highest death rate, even higher than those who are considered obese based on BMI. From a public health perspective, this is a significant finding.’ 

 The latest study looked at data on 12,785 people aged 18 and over, who were divided into three categories of BMI – normal, overweight and obese – then divided by whether waistlines were normal or larger. Over 14 years, there were 2,562 deaths, of which 1,138 were cardiovascular-related. The highest risk of death was in people with normal BMI and large waistlines. 

Dr Karine Sahakyan, who is a cardiology research fellow at the Mayo Clinic, presented the findings yesterday at the European Cardiology Congress in Munich. Dr Lopez-Jimenez added: ‘Our research shows that if a person has a normal BMI, this by itself should not reassure them that their risk for heart disease is low.

 'Where their fat is distributed on their body can mean a lot, and that can be determined easily by getting a waist-to-hip measurement, even if their body weight is within normal limits.’

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Posted in: latest health news,obesity information

How a glass of red wine could PREVENT you from putting on weight

If you want to avoid gaining weight, it may be time to ditch the skipping rope and grab a corkscrew instead.

For U.S. experts have found a compound in red wine that can help control obesity.

The substance, piceatannol, delays the generation of young fat cells and prevents them from growing into mature ones.

It is also thought to protect the body from heart and neurodegenerative diseases, as well as cancer.

The compound blocks insulin’s ability to activate genes that carry out further stages of fat cell formation.

The agent found in wine is also thought to protect the body from heart and neurodegenerative diseases and cancer.

The groundbreaking research was carried out at Purdue University, Indiana, USA.

Lead researcher Dr Kee-Hong Kim said: 'In the presence of piceatannol you can see delay or complete inhibition of young fat cells.

'Piceatannol alters the timing of gene expressions, gene functions and insulin action during adipogenesis - the process in which young fat cells become mature fat cells.'

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Posted in: How a glass of red wine could PREVENT you from putting on weight,latest health news,obesity information,red wine news

‘Everything you know about dieting is wrong

Vancouver -Everything you know about dieting is wrong, say US scientists who have devised a new formula for calculating calories and weight loss that they hope will revolutionise the way people tackle obesity.

Obesity rates have doubled worldwide in the past 30 years, coinciding with a growing food surplus, and the ensuing epidemic has sparked a multibillion dollar weight loss industry that has largely failed to curb the problem.

Current standards in the United States, where two thirds of people are overweight or obese, advise people that cutting calories by a certain amount will result in a slow and steady weight loss over time.

But that advice fails to account for how the body changes as it slims down, burning less energy and acquiring a slower metabolism, researchers told the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Vancouver.

The result is a plateau effect that ends up discouraging dieters and sending them back into harmful patterns of overeating.

As an example, researcher Kevin Hall offered up his large vanilla latte, purchased at a popular coffee shop. When he asked, the barista told him it contained about 240 calories.

“The notion was if I drank one of these every day and then I replaced it with just black coffee no sugar, then over the course of a year I should lose about 25 pounds, and that should just keep going,” Hall told reporters.

“People have used this sort of rule of thumb to predict how much people should lose for decades now, and it turns out to be completely wrong.”

Hall, a scientist with the US National Institutes of Health, said his work aims to “come up with better rules and better predictions of what is going to happen when an individual changes their diet.”

He and colleagues said their scientific model is aimed to help doctors and policymakers, while a “back-of-the-envelope calculation” for consumers means cutting small amounts of daily calories, but expecting to cut more over time.

“If I want to lose 10 pounds of weight eventually, I have to cut 100 calories per day out of my diet,” Hall explained.

“You'll get halfway there in about a year, and then you will eventually plateau, (reaching the goal) after about three years,” he added.

“For folks abroad that works out to about 100 kilojoules per day per kilogram. The contrast is the old rule of thumb predicts twice as much weight loss after a year, and it gets worse after that.”

The new model gives dieters one calorie goal for short term weight loss and another for permanent weight loss. Exercise is also calculated in to help set realistic goals.

Study co-author Carson Chow, also with NIH, said the daily calorie cut needed for weight loss was actually smaller than researchers anticipated.

“It is essentially one cookie different a day, so a 150 calorie cookie leads to a seven kilogram (15 pound) difference in weight. That is huge in my opinion,” Chow said.

“I think the surprise it is such a little change can affect such a great difference in weight, and yet we still can't seem do it.”

Their model was first published in The Lancet in August 2011, and a link is available at http://bwsimulator.niddk.nih.gov.

“People can plug in some information about their initial age, their height, their weight, some estimate of their physical activity level,” Hall said.

Add in a goal weight and the “model will simulate what changes of diet or exercise that person would have to do to achieve that goal weight, and then even more importantly what they need to do permanently maintain that weight loss.”

Since The Lancet article appeared, the notion has not exactly taken the world by storm, in part because it's not primed for public use, but is mainly aimed at doctors and researchers with adult American patients for now.

Also, if a dieter enters an extreme weight goal, the number of calories the model returns may be much too low to be realistic or healthy, so it needs an expert's interpretation.

“It's not particularly user friendly... but it is still relatively informative,” said Hall, who maintains hope that some day his message will be heard.

“There is a lot of inertia behind these old rules of thumb,” he said, adding that he was heartened by an editorial in December in the journal of the American Dietetic Association that commented on the idea of a weight loss plateau and mentioned the new simulator.

“It's going to take some time to get the public and the professional community aware that there is a new way of doing things, and we actually have some tools that weren't available before.” - Sapa-AFP

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Posted in: best dieting tips,obesity information,overweight problems

Obesity Information

Obesity is a condition of the body, wherein there is an increase in the body adipose tissue (fat tissue) mass. The food that we consume on a daily basis provides us with the nutrients required for proper functioning of the body.

The calories present in food items are used in the form of energy, by our body, for accomplishing various physical tasks. However, regular binging on high calorie food leads to an accumulation of excess calories in the body, as fat, resulting in obesity. To know more about the causes and symptoms of obesity, read through the following lines.

Causes Of Obesity

.Genetic factors

.Physical inactivity 

.Emotional or psychological factors

 .Stress

 .High-fat / high calorie diet

 .Medical problems

 .Quitting smoking

 .Certain medications 

 .Wrong combination of food

 .Pregnancy

 .Overeating

 .Family Influence

 .Eating too much sugary foods 

.Slow metabolism Weight cycling, caused by repeated attempts to lose weight by dieting, followed by binge eating

. Underlying illness, such as hypothyroidism

. Eating disorders, such as binge eating disorder 

.Insufficient sleep

 Symptoms Of Obesity

 .Breathing disorders, such as sleep apnea and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

.Certain types of cancers, such as prostate and bowel cancer in men and br*ast and uterine cancer in women

 .Coronary artery (heart) disease

 .Depression

 .Gallbladder or liver disease 

.Gastroesophageal reflux disease

 .(GERD) High blood pressure

.High cholesterol Joint disease, such as osteoarthritis Stroke Diabetes (type 2) Joint problems, for example arthritis Heart disease Heartburn Snoring Problems with fertility and pregnancy Urinary incontinence Shorter life expectancy Negative self-image Social isolation Discrimination Difficulty in undertaking normal tasks Difficulty in maintaining personal hygiene

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Posted in: health hazards,obesity information