KTK-Nutrition

How can you add some activity to your every day life?   So much to do?   Commute to work.   Sit at a desk job. Commute back home and watch some TV or have some other screen time.   How can you switch up a sedentary lifestyle to a more active lifestyle?   And doing so will lower your risk of a number of diseases.   Just moving more can help one lose weight or keep off the weight you have lost.   And reducing your weight by 5% or more can lower your risk of heart disease and Type 2 diabetes.   An article in Verywell Health described, 9 Ways to Beat a Sedentary Lifestyle .   What are some of their suggestions and others you can try? Walking – aim for a 30 minute walk a day.   I used to commute to work, have a desk job, but planned a walk with friends at lunch every day.    No time for 30 minutes?   Then take three 10-minute walks each day. If you commute by bus or train, then get off a few blocks before your stop and wa...

Are there things you can do to rev up your metabolism?   Yes.   There are things you can do to rev it up in the short run and other things that will rev up your metabolism longer term.   Some people complain they have a slow metabolism and envy those who seem to have a faster metabolism.   Well there are people that will have a faster metabolism than you for a number of reasons.   So why do some people seem to have a more revved up metabolism?   What are the things you can do to boost your metabolism both in the short term and long term? Who has a faster metabolism? Men – guys will have a faster metabolism than women, even if they are the same height and weight.   Why?   Because guys have more muscle than women. Tall people – the taller one is, the higher their metabolism.   Age – younger people have a faster metabolism than older people.   Metabolism starts to slow after age 40 and some say before that.   It slows about 5%...

Many people have jobs requiring them to sit for a long time, up to 8 hours or more a day.   The latest research indicates that you can help reverse the damage sitting does to your health by going on an hour-long walk.    This week, WTOP reported on:   To reverse damage of sitting, take a brisk, hour-long walk . What are the health risks of sitting for long periods? Norwegian scientists studied over   1 million people who sat for at least 8 hours a day.    According to the researchers, this much sitting is as harmful to your health as obesity or even smoking.   A number of studies have shown that prolonged sitting can increase your risk of heart disease, various types of cancer and even an earlier death. But it isn’t just sitting at the job.   A new trend is binge TV watching, such as watching an entire Season of a show on Netflix.    Sitting for 5 hours or more watching TV is also bad for your health.   Add the sitting ...

Every month I get the Diabetes Forecast magazine.    It always has some interesting articles on nutrition.   The January/February and May/June 2016 issues have many interesting updates on nutrition and health.   Here are a few.   Sit Less, Move More.   Can sitting increase your risk of developing Type 2 Diabetes?   Apparently so.   To study this researchers gave 2,497 adults 24 hour activity monitors.   The 2,497 adults included 1,395 with normal glucose, 714 with type 2 diabetes, and 388 with prediabetes.   Study participants were tracked for 8 days.   The activity differences didn’t seem like much as those with Type 2 Diabetes sat 26 more minutes a day.    Every hour sitting and not moving can increase your chances of developing type 2 diabetes by 22%.   This doesn’t mean you have to run a marathon as study authors noted just standing up every hour helps.   Watching TV, then stand up and walk around during ...

Too many Americans are couch potatoes.   Not just sitting or lying on the couch but sitting and being sedentary for a good portion of the day.   In my recent nutrition class, we talked about overweight children.   A number of studies have shown overweight children don’t necessarily eat more than their peers but they do sit more than their peers and get much less exercise.   Not only is exercise beneficial to our health in many ways, it may actually reduce our risk of cancer and reduce inflammation.   An article in Environmental Nutrition notes, “Regular physical activity seems to reduce chronic low-grade inflammation that can lead to DNA damage and promotes unhealthy cell growth that can lead to cancer.”   (Cancer-fighting plant foods ) More physical exercise lowers our risk of a number of cancers. But one can’t just exercise for 30 minutes and then sit the rest of the day.   Studies have also shown sitting too much seems to negate some of the...