Weight loss expert will stress mission
Canadians spend $5 Billion on weight loss
Twice as many overweight Canadians despite $3 Trillion in health care spending
HAMILTON: Hamilton weight loss guru Lee Fairbanks will be entering The Dragons’ Den this fall. The Keep Canada Slim president has been chosen as a contestant for the popular CBC television reality program. Filming for next fall's series begins in May.
The Dragons’ Den gives small business owners the opportunity to pitch their ideas to successful multi-millionaire investors. Last year the Dragons invested more than $9 million in these ventures. The show has more than one million weekly viewers.
Fairbanks is excited about the opportunity and confident that The Dragons will choose to partner with him on the expansion of his business across Canada. He said he intends to stress the mission of Keep Canada Slim as well as the money.
“The timing is perfect for this opportunity with us" explains Fairbanks. "Canada is facing the greatest health crisis in its history and that is the dramatic increase in the number of overweight and obese people. Obesity leads to degenerative disease but our government health agencies have proven to be incapable of meeting this crisis. Despite spending more than $3 trillion in the past 30 years on health care we now have twice as many overweight and obese people.”
“As the Baby Boomers, the world's most obese people, move into their 60s the burden on our health care system will become impossible to fund. Keep Canada Slim is the only viable solution to this crisis because it is the only commercially available program that is not based on yo-yo diet principles."
"The Boomers are at a loss as to how to prevent weight gain and its resulting degenerative diseases since every diet program they have attempted has resulted in the yo-yo effect and has caused them to become fatter. Those who used exercise to maintain their weight are now finding with age it is impossible to keep up the pace. Canadians currently spend more than $5 billion on weight loss programs that have a failure rate of more than 90 per cent.”
“Keep Canada Slim is the only commercially available program that teaches weight loss without exercise, and without the rebound effect. It is the only program that can be effectively self-taught and is therefore available to every Canadian no matter where they live. And it is also the most economical option. I am confident that the Dragons will recognize the phenomenal business opportunity this combination of events provides."
Keep Canada Slim provides a step-by-step multi-media approach to changing shopping, cooking and eating habits for weight control and better health. The system was refined through personal consultations with thousands of Canadians over the past 11 years in wellness offices across the country. Today the system is available to the general public in CD form, DVD and written material.
Keep Canada Slim can be purchased through the company website at www.keepcanadaslim.com or through registered consultants at offices across the country in London, Simcoe, Alliston, St. Catharines, Newmarket, Brantford, Timmins, Stoney Creek, Hamilton, Winnipeg, and Sundre, Alberta.
Filming for the Keep Canada Slim segment of the show will be held on May 7 but Fairbanks is sworn to secrecy on the Dragon's decision until the show airs in September.
Contact:
Lee Fairbanks, President, Keep Canada Slim
bigskinny@keepcanadaslim.com
905.628.0279
Richard Maerov, Producer, The Dragons’ Den
richard.maerov@cbc.ca
416.205.3819
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Rat Science fools Weight Loss Researchers
Hamilton, April 15, 2009: ‘Rat Science’ Doesn't Work For Humans.
Obesity experts have failed to discover the secret to successful weight loss because their work with rats in the laboratory does not relate to real human experience. That's the opinion of one of Canada's leading lifestyle experts.
"In the past 11 years we have consulted with thousands of Canadians who are consistently consuming less than 1200 calories per day, often for months and years at a time without any weight loss," explains Keep America / Keep Canada Slim President Lee Fairbanks. “This flies in the face of traditional science which has always claimed that weight loss or weight gain is a simple equation of calories in versus calories out.”
Maintenance calorie levels for non-exercising women typically range between 1600 and 2000 calories a day.
"When I have discussed this phenomenon with researchers and scientists they simply tell me that all of these thousands of people have been lying constantly about what they actually eat. This is a personal insult to all involved and is also clearly invalid as an explanation of what we observe in the real world."
Keep Canada Slim is a weight control program that teaches a new approach to shopping, cooking and eating. It was founded 11 years ago by Fairbanks and is the only program in Canada which establishes minimum calorie levels for each individual client as well as maximum calorie levels. For information on Keep Canada Slim go to www.keepcanadaslim.com.
Fairbanks claims that a significant number of Canadians - "in the millions" - are currently undereating almost every day in a desperate attempt to either lose weight or maintain their current weight. This habit of undereating leaves them nutritionally deficient and increases their risk of degenerative disease later in life.
Perhaps more important to those trying to lose weight, Fairbanks says his research with real Canadians shows that this low-calorie lifestyle does not create ongoing weight loss and in fact has the risk of causing muscle loss in the absence of sufficient calories for energy from food.
Fairbanks says the fault lies in the way scientists use rats to study obesity.
"The human body has an amazing ability to adapt to whatever challenges it faces,” explains Fairbanks. “During repeated cycles of low-calorie diets leading eventually to a permanent low-calorie lifestyle, the body adapts its metabolic processes to allow it to survive for years without measureable health risk despite not receiving adequate levels of energy and nutrition.”
“In a lab rats are put through a single cycle of dietary adjustments and then killed so that the results can be measured. Because of this single cycle approach it's natural for scientists to conclude that weight control is simply a matter of calories in versus calories out. This equation does work in humans the first or second time they try it. However scientists never experience the cyclical nature of ongoing dieting and therefore do not observe the adaptation process.”
Fairbanks says that this knowledge is slowly creeping into academic circles (see reference below) but that it may be decades before scientists can agree on how this process occurs and be willing to put their reputations at risk by making these claims publicly.
"With advanced real-time measurement of human metabolism and continued studies of existing diet programs some scientists are starting to realize that the traditional explanations don't explain what is happening. There are clinical trials emerging which prove that people do not lose the expected weight based on the calories in - calories out equation. However no one has made this claim publicly.”
“In the meantime the millions of Canadians who are already undereating are still being told to eat less and exercise more. In our program it is routine for us to insist that clients eat more calories every day than they are currently eating. As soon as they surpass their minimum calorie level the adaptive process stops and weight loss restarts. This has been the case with thousands of real people living real lives. Lab rats are not people."
Fairbanks points out that Canadians have been following the “eat less” instructions for decades, and yet even highly-educated, highly-motivated people are not having success losing weight this way.
“Demographic researchers like to point out that obesity rates are higher among low-income and poorly-educated Canadians, but go to any $100-a-plate fund-raising dinner and you will see that obesity rates are too high in every level of our society. It’s time we stopped studying rats and starting learning what real people are doing every day. Then our message will have validity.”
Keep Canada Slim can be purchased through the company website at www.keepcanadaslim.com or through registered consultants at offices across the country in London, Simcoe, Alliston, St. Catharines, Timmins, Stoney Creek, Hamilton, Winnipeg, and Sundre, Alberta.
-30-
Contacts
Lee Fairbanks, President, Keep Canada Slim
bigskinny@keepcanadaslim.com
905.628.0279
Ref: Why do obese patients not lose more weight when treated with low calorie diets? A mechanistic perspective.
Steven B Heymsfield, Joyce B Harp, Marc L Reitman, Joel W Beetsch, Dale A Schoeller, Ngozi Erondu, and Angelo Pietrobelli
Am J Clin Nutr 2007;85:346–54. Printed in USA. © 2007 American Society for Nutrition
Obesity experts have failed to discover the secret to successful weight loss because their work with rats in the laboratory does not relate to real human experience. That's the opinion of one of Canada's leading lifestyle experts.
"In the past 11 years we have consulted with thousands of Canadians who are consistently consuming less than 1200 calories per day, often for months and years at a time without any weight loss," explains Keep America / Keep Canada Slim President Lee Fairbanks. “This flies in the face of traditional science which has always claimed that weight loss or weight gain is a simple equation of calories in versus calories out.”
Maintenance calorie levels for non-exercising women typically range between 1600 and 2000 calories a day.
"When I have discussed this phenomenon with researchers and scientists they simply tell me that all of these thousands of people have been lying constantly about what they actually eat. This is a personal insult to all involved and is also clearly invalid as an explanation of what we observe in the real world."
Keep Canada Slim is a weight control program that teaches a new approach to shopping, cooking and eating. It was founded 11 years ago by Fairbanks and is the only program in Canada which establishes minimum calorie levels for each individual client as well as maximum calorie levels. For information on Keep Canada Slim go to www.keepcanadaslim.com.
Fairbanks claims that a significant number of Canadians - "in the millions" - are currently undereating almost every day in a desperate attempt to either lose weight or maintain their current weight. This habit of undereating leaves them nutritionally deficient and increases their risk of degenerative disease later in life.
Perhaps more important to those trying to lose weight, Fairbanks says his research with real Canadians shows that this low-calorie lifestyle does not create ongoing weight loss and in fact has the risk of causing muscle loss in the absence of sufficient calories for energy from food.
Fairbanks says the fault lies in the way scientists use rats to study obesity.
"The human body has an amazing ability to adapt to whatever challenges it faces,” explains Fairbanks. “During repeated cycles of low-calorie diets leading eventually to a permanent low-calorie lifestyle, the body adapts its metabolic processes to allow it to survive for years without measureable health risk despite not receiving adequate levels of energy and nutrition.”
“In a lab rats are put through a single cycle of dietary adjustments and then killed so that the results can be measured. Because of this single cycle approach it's natural for scientists to conclude that weight control is simply a matter of calories in versus calories out. This equation does work in humans the first or second time they try it. However scientists never experience the cyclical nature of ongoing dieting and therefore do not observe the adaptation process.”
Fairbanks says that this knowledge is slowly creeping into academic circles (see reference below) but that it may be decades before scientists can agree on how this process occurs and be willing to put their reputations at risk by making these claims publicly.
"With advanced real-time measurement of human metabolism and continued studies of existing diet programs some scientists are starting to realize that the traditional explanations don't explain what is happening. There are clinical trials emerging which prove that people do not lose the expected weight based on the calories in - calories out equation. However no one has made this claim publicly.”
“In the meantime the millions of Canadians who are already undereating are still being told to eat less and exercise more. In our program it is routine for us to insist that clients eat more calories every day than they are currently eating. As soon as they surpass their minimum calorie level the adaptive process stops and weight loss restarts. This has been the case with thousands of real people living real lives. Lab rats are not people."
Fairbanks points out that Canadians have been following the “eat less” instructions for decades, and yet even highly-educated, highly-motivated people are not having success losing weight this way.
“Demographic researchers like to point out that obesity rates are higher among low-income and poorly-educated Canadians, but go to any $100-a-plate fund-raising dinner and you will see that obesity rates are too high in every level of our society. It’s time we stopped studying rats and starting learning what real people are doing every day. Then our message will have validity.”
Keep Canada Slim can be purchased through the company website at www.keepcanadaslim.com or through registered consultants at offices across the country in London, Simcoe, Alliston, St. Catharines, Timmins, Stoney Creek, Hamilton, Winnipeg, and Sundre, Alberta.
-30-
Contacts
Lee Fairbanks, President, Keep Canada Slim
bigskinny@keepcanadaslim.com
905.628.0279
Ref: Why do obese patients not lose more weight when treated with low calorie diets? A mechanistic perspective.
Steven B Heymsfield, Joyce B Harp, Marc L Reitman, Joel W Beetsch, Dale A Schoeller, Ngozi Erondu, and Angelo Pietrobelli
Am J Clin Nutr 2007;85:346–54. Printed in USA. © 2007 American Society for Nutrition
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Canadian Prime Minister Chooses Keep Canada Slim
For Immediate Release April 1, 2009
OTTAWA: Prime Minister Stephen Harper today announced that he has chosen Keep Canada Slim (KCS) for his personal weight loss program. Harper said he intends to set the pace for the country by losing 20 pounds.
“Obesity is the Number One health issue facing our country,” said Mr. Harper, “and I believe as leader of the country I should set a good example and lead the way to a healthier future for Canada. Together we can Keep Canada Slim.”
KCS President Lee Fairbanks said he will personally supervise the PM’s weight loss plan. “It is very common for minority party members to gain 20 pounds a year in office, especially a high office such as Prime Minister,” he explained. “This weight gain comes from the stress of being responsible for the country but not having any real control in decision-making. Stress is known to increase abdominal fat, especially in people over 40.”
Fairbanks said the second leading cause of weight gain for politicians comes from eating too many cocktail wieners at political events.
For more information about the KCS program go to www.keepcanadaslim.com.
“I have been charting Mr. Harper’s eating habits for the past month as we put together a personalized program for him, and he consumes three times the normal amount of cocktail wieners, when compared to his predecessors, Prime Ministers Martin and Chrétien.”
Fairbanks said Martin, know for fastidious eating habits, rarely consumed more than 2 cocktail wieners per day, except when campaigning, when he increased his intake to as many as 8. One of Chrétien’s favourite habits was to dip the wieners in poutine sauce.
“The poutine sauce made it very difficult to accurately calculate Mr. Chrétien’s overall fat and calorie intake, but he was able to offset this habit by the fact that he was such a fast talker. Mr. Chrétien burned on average 50% more calories per word than the average PM,” explained Fairbanks.
Fairbanks says Harper’s increasing weight is also a result of his political leaning as a Conservative.
“It’s well known that Conservatives gain more weight in office than Liberals. This started with Trudeau and continued with Chrétien and Martin,” explained Fairbanks. “Liberals by nature tend to jump from one side of an argument to another depending on polls, whereas Conservatives tend to take a stand and stick with it. This jumping around causes Liberals to keep their weight down.”
Fairbanks points to former PM Joe Clark as an example. “Before he became PM he was quite slim, but within months of his appointment he developed a double chin. This was because of his inability to change his position on wage and price controls. Trudeau on the other hand was a master at reversing his position, and remained slim all his life.”
Fairbanks said Mr. Harper’s personalized plan would include limiting cocktail wieners to 2 per day, and encouraging him to change his mind more often.
“People who change their mind more often tend to become emotional in defence of their never-ending new strategies. In Parliament this results in more standing to defend positions and make new statements, which burns off more calories.”
Keep Canada Slim has also started work on a new menu for the dining hall on Parliament Hill. This will focus on adding fibre to their meals.
“We have added psyllium fibre to the poutine,” said Fairbanks. “This should increase the quality and quantity of bowel movements, which should be n the nation’s best interest.”
Keep Canada Slim is a member of the Canadian Obesity Network an association of more than 1,000 of Canada’s leading obesity researchers.
Keep Canada Slim materials can be purchased by individuals through participating offices or on the website at www.keepcanadaslim.com. Consultations are offered through medical and wellness centres in Alliston, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Stoney Creek, London, Simcoe, Timmins, Winnipeg, Sundre, Alberta and Calgary. The program is also available at the Brantford St. Joseph’s Hospital Lifecare Centre.
OTTAWA: Prime Minister Stephen Harper today announced that he has chosen Keep Canada Slim (KCS) for his personal weight loss program. Harper said he intends to set the pace for the country by losing 20 pounds.
“Obesity is the Number One health issue facing our country,” said Mr. Harper, “and I believe as leader of the country I should set a good example and lead the way to a healthier future for Canada. Together we can Keep Canada Slim.”
KCS President Lee Fairbanks said he will personally supervise the PM’s weight loss plan. “It is very common for minority party members to gain 20 pounds a year in office, especially a high office such as Prime Minister,” he explained. “This weight gain comes from the stress of being responsible for the country but not having any real control in decision-making. Stress is known to increase abdominal fat, especially in people over 40.”
Fairbanks said the second leading cause of weight gain for politicians comes from eating too many cocktail wieners at political events.
For more information about the KCS program go to www.keepcanadaslim.com.
“I have been charting Mr. Harper’s eating habits for the past month as we put together a personalized program for him, and he consumes three times the normal amount of cocktail wieners, when compared to his predecessors, Prime Ministers Martin and Chrétien.”
Fairbanks said Martin, know for fastidious eating habits, rarely consumed more than 2 cocktail wieners per day, except when campaigning, when he increased his intake to as many as 8. One of Chrétien’s favourite habits was to dip the wieners in poutine sauce.
“The poutine sauce made it very difficult to accurately calculate Mr. Chrétien’s overall fat and calorie intake, but he was able to offset this habit by the fact that he was such a fast talker. Mr. Chrétien burned on average 50% more calories per word than the average PM,” explained Fairbanks.
Fairbanks says Harper’s increasing weight is also a result of his political leaning as a Conservative.
“It’s well known that Conservatives gain more weight in office than Liberals. This started with Trudeau and continued with Chrétien and Martin,” explained Fairbanks. “Liberals by nature tend to jump from one side of an argument to another depending on polls, whereas Conservatives tend to take a stand and stick with it. This jumping around causes Liberals to keep their weight down.”
Fairbanks points to former PM Joe Clark as an example. “Before he became PM he was quite slim, but within months of his appointment he developed a double chin. This was because of his inability to change his position on wage and price controls. Trudeau on the other hand was a master at reversing his position, and remained slim all his life.”
Fairbanks said Mr. Harper’s personalized plan would include limiting cocktail wieners to 2 per day, and encouraging him to change his mind more often.
“People who change their mind more often tend to become emotional in defence of their never-ending new strategies. In Parliament this results in more standing to defend positions and make new statements, which burns off more calories.”
Keep Canada Slim has also started work on a new menu for the dining hall on Parliament Hill. This will focus on adding fibre to their meals.
“We have added psyllium fibre to the poutine,” said Fairbanks. “This should increase the quality and quantity of bowel movements, which should be n the nation’s best interest.”
Keep Canada Slim is a member of the Canadian Obesity Network an association of more than 1,000 of Canada’s leading obesity researchers.
Keep Canada Slim materials can be purchased by individuals through participating offices or on the website at www.keepcanadaslim.com. Consultations are offered through medical and wellness centres in Alliston, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Stoney Creek, London, Simcoe, Timmins, Winnipeg, Sundre, Alberta and Calgary. The program is also available at the Brantford St. Joseph’s Hospital Lifecare Centre.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Hamilton Author to Speak on Weight, Longevity at Toronto Anti Aging Show
Monday, March 30, 2009 HAMILTON – Hamilton author and Keep Canada / Keep America Slim president Lee Fairbanks is the lead speaker joining some of North America’s top anti-aging specialists at the International Anti-Aging Show April 3-4-5 at Toronto's International Centre. He opens the seminar schedule at 1 pm, Friday.
Fairbanks completes a list of more than 15 experts that includes keynote speaker Dr. Pamela Smith, a women’s hormone expert from Michigan; Toronto TV host and homeopathic doctor Bryce Wylde; Bruce Krahn (The Fat Fighter Diet); Chelation Therapy expert Bill Allin; Florida TV Host Jackie Silver; and Colleen Hoffman Smith (The Inner Workout).
Fairbanks, an award winning journalist and resident weight loss expert for CHTV’s Live at 5:30 show with Mark Hebscher and Donna Skelly, will be discussing the hidden connection between losing weight and living longer.
“I will be looking at how we tend to ‘lower the bar’ as we age, so that we continue to think we are aging well, when in fact we are deteriorating at a faster than necessary rate,” explained Fairbanks. “We have been brought up in a pro-drug culture, with a misplaced belief that we are healthy when we control symptoms with pharmaceuticals. This rush to drug ourselves and our seniors instead of promoting wellness strategies is really misplaced.”
Fairbanks claims that people accept the side effects of drugs as being necessary to maintain health, when in fact they simply mask one problem while creating others. Eventually the new symptoms become health conditions of their own. The true path to a longer healthier life is to avoid drugs unless your condition is life threatening, and to use natural means such as better food choices to support health as we age.
“A long healthy life starts with how you shop, cook and eat,” he says. “Food is nature’s pharmacy, and we need to return to those roots if we want to avoid illness as we age.”
Fairbanks says the Keep Canada Slim program www.keepcanadaslim.com teaches the necessary choices to not only lose weight and keep it off, but to extend healthy lifespan as well.
“People usually separate weight loss from health, and this mistake backfires into increased degenerative disease risk. By embracing low-calorie diets people undermine their health as they lose weight. In addition, they lose muscle and bone density as part of their overall weight loss. This increases the risk of cancer, heart disease, osteoporosis and diabetes,” he explains.
“We have discovered a way to combine the known strategies of a longer life with the goal of achieving and maintaining a healthy body weight and body composition. Our goal is not simply to ‘get’ people slim temporarily, as is the case with diets, but to ‘keep’ people slim now and throughout their life. And in the process, people will learn a way to shop, cook and eat that will give them a longer healthier life.”
Fairbanks is the opening speaker at the Anti-Aging show, going onstage Friday at 1 pm. He will also speak Saturday at 3 pm., and be available personally at the Keep Canada Slim booth all weekend.
The show hours are Friday, 12-7 pm; Sat, 10 am – 6 pm; Sun, 11 am – 6 pm. For details go to www.theantiagingshow.com
Fairbanks completes a list of more than 15 experts that includes keynote speaker Dr. Pamela Smith, a women’s hormone expert from Michigan; Toronto TV host and homeopathic doctor Bryce Wylde; Bruce Krahn (The Fat Fighter Diet); Chelation Therapy expert Bill Allin; Florida TV Host Jackie Silver; and Colleen Hoffman Smith (The Inner Workout).
Fairbanks, an award winning journalist and resident weight loss expert for CHTV’s Live at 5:30 show with Mark Hebscher and Donna Skelly, will be discussing the hidden connection between losing weight and living longer.
“I will be looking at how we tend to ‘lower the bar’ as we age, so that we continue to think we are aging well, when in fact we are deteriorating at a faster than necessary rate,” explained Fairbanks. “We have been brought up in a pro-drug culture, with a misplaced belief that we are healthy when we control symptoms with pharmaceuticals. This rush to drug ourselves and our seniors instead of promoting wellness strategies is really misplaced.”
Fairbanks claims that people accept the side effects of drugs as being necessary to maintain health, when in fact they simply mask one problem while creating others. Eventually the new symptoms become health conditions of their own. The true path to a longer healthier life is to avoid drugs unless your condition is life threatening, and to use natural means such as better food choices to support health as we age.
“A long healthy life starts with how you shop, cook and eat,” he says. “Food is nature’s pharmacy, and we need to return to those roots if we want to avoid illness as we age.”
Fairbanks says the Keep Canada Slim program www.keepcanadaslim.com teaches the necessary choices to not only lose weight and keep it off, but to extend healthy lifespan as well.
“People usually separate weight loss from health, and this mistake backfires into increased degenerative disease risk. By embracing low-calorie diets people undermine their health as they lose weight. In addition, they lose muscle and bone density as part of their overall weight loss. This increases the risk of cancer, heart disease, osteoporosis and diabetes,” he explains.
“We have discovered a way to combine the known strategies of a longer life with the goal of achieving and maintaining a healthy body weight and body composition. Our goal is not simply to ‘get’ people slim temporarily, as is the case with diets, but to ‘keep’ people slim now and throughout their life. And in the process, people will learn a way to shop, cook and eat that will give them a longer healthier life.”
Fairbanks is the opening speaker at the Anti-Aging show, going onstage Friday at 1 pm. He will also speak Saturday at 3 pm., and be available personally at the Keep Canada Slim booth all weekend.
The show hours are Friday, 12-7 pm; Sat, 10 am – 6 pm; Sun, 11 am – 6 pm. For details go to www.theantiagingshow.com
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Is your BMI reading false?
How do you measure your weight?
A news release last week from the head of the Canadian Obesity Network suggested that some obese people are in fact healthy and do not need to lose weight. This of course flies in the face of logic, so let’s look at the facts and see if we can make sense of this statement.
Dr. Arya Sharma says that as many as one-third of people deemed obese according to their BMI (Body Mass Index, which is the relationship between height and weight) have no medically-determined risk factors for heart disease and should not be counselled to lose weight.
Dr. Sharma goes on to say that since most people gain weight back after they lose it, the practical advice would be to simply suggest they not gain any further weight. Here’s the challenge with this thinking:
First off, the BMI is NOT an accurate measurement of obesity and should never be taken as such. The BMI was a creation of the insurance industry, which uses it as part of actuarial tables to determine mortality risk when issuing life insurance policies. Only recently has the medical community begun to use it in the evaluation of obesity and related risk factors. Doctors use it because it is easy to measure.
In truth, the key measurement needed to measure obesity is body fat percentage – the percentage of fat compared to lean muscle, bones, organ tissue, water and fecal matter.
Here’s more: The BMI is known to be only accurate as related to body fat percentage for 68% of people. So the “revelation” that 1/3 of people measured as obese by their BMI are in fact not obese is no surprise to anyone with a wellness background.
Let me give you a typical example. On the BMI, almost all professional football linemen are obese, because the amount of muscle they have makes their weight in relation to their height “off the charts.” In fact however, most linemen have a body fat percentage of about 15-16%, which puts them right in the middle of the recommended range of 11-19% for men.
By comparison, running backs and defensive backs who are built for speed instead of muscle might be 5-10% fat.
So if you have heard that obese people might be healthy despite their weight, please disregard this info. You should measure body fat percentage.
There are several ways to do this. The most effective, but least practical are air and water displacement units, typically only found in research labs. More practical but slightly less accurate would be hand-held callipers. These can be purchased for less than $30 and are accurate for approximately 85-90% of people, when used by an experienced operator. Many gyms use this method.
Another method is electronic impedance scales or hand-held units, which can now be bought for less than $50 at most major department stores. These are about 80% accurate.
Both these methods are less effective for people with more than average muscle mass, or those who are highly obese. For these people, waist measurement can often be the best place to start.
Doctors have recently begun to promote the concept that women with a waist size less than 32 inches and a man below 37 inches are not overweight. I would suggest that these numbers are much too high, and that this scale should adjust for height. Obviously a 5-foot man and a 6-foor man should not be expected to have the same waist size.
There are also many free programs available on websites where you can get a body fat estimate based on specific measurements. We have one on our website at www.keepcanadaslim.com. Go there right now and find out how you are doing. It takes only a minute. This estimate will give you a starting point should you decide you want to change the shape you’re in.
Men should aim for 11-19%, women 17-23%, going as high as 25% if they are post-menopausal. High level athletes and those on a serious muscle-building workout program may be lower, although women who drop below 15% often stop having periods, which doesn’t seem to be a sign of health to me.
In closing, it is unfair to medical doctors to expect them to be experts in prevention. Doctors treat disease. The key point Dr. Sharma was making is that these patients have no sign of heart disease. Their blood pressure and cholesterol levels are within normal limits. Therefore doctors should not be using the resources of the medical system – which is under tremendous financial pressure – to “treat” them.
Unfortunately the extension of that is if left alone, these weight issues may eventually contribute to measureable risk factors, and then the person will be gladly accepted as a patient!
From a wellness perspective, we’d like to suggest people adjust their lifestyle to one that will prevent weight gain – plus adopt a shopping, cooking and eating program that will improve their health.
But don’t expect to find that program through our doctors.
In closing – forget the BMI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
A news release last week from the head of the Canadian Obesity Network suggested that some obese people are in fact healthy and do not need to lose weight. This of course flies in the face of logic, so let’s look at the facts and see if we can make sense of this statement.
Dr. Arya Sharma says that as many as one-third of people deemed obese according to their BMI (Body Mass Index, which is the relationship between height and weight) have no medically-determined risk factors for heart disease and should not be counselled to lose weight.
Dr. Sharma goes on to say that since most people gain weight back after they lose it, the practical advice would be to simply suggest they not gain any further weight. Here’s the challenge with this thinking:
First off, the BMI is NOT an accurate measurement of obesity and should never be taken as such. The BMI was a creation of the insurance industry, which uses it as part of actuarial tables to determine mortality risk when issuing life insurance policies. Only recently has the medical community begun to use it in the evaluation of obesity and related risk factors. Doctors use it because it is easy to measure.
In truth, the key measurement needed to measure obesity is body fat percentage – the percentage of fat compared to lean muscle, bones, organ tissue, water and fecal matter.
Here’s more: The BMI is known to be only accurate as related to body fat percentage for 68% of people. So the “revelation” that 1/3 of people measured as obese by their BMI are in fact not obese is no surprise to anyone with a wellness background.
Let me give you a typical example. On the BMI, almost all professional football linemen are obese, because the amount of muscle they have makes their weight in relation to their height “off the charts.” In fact however, most linemen have a body fat percentage of about 15-16%, which puts them right in the middle of the recommended range of 11-19% for men.
By comparison, running backs and defensive backs who are built for speed instead of muscle might be 5-10% fat.
So if you have heard that obese people might be healthy despite their weight, please disregard this info. You should measure body fat percentage.
There are several ways to do this. The most effective, but least practical are air and water displacement units, typically only found in research labs. More practical but slightly less accurate would be hand-held callipers. These can be purchased for less than $30 and are accurate for approximately 85-90% of people, when used by an experienced operator. Many gyms use this method.
Another method is electronic impedance scales or hand-held units, which can now be bought for less than $50 at most major department stores. These are about 80% accurate.
Both these methods are less effective for people with more than average muscle mass, or those who are highly obese. For these people, waist measurement can often be the best place to start.
Doctors have recently begun to promote the concept that women with a waist size less than 32 inches and a man below 37 inches are not overweight. I would suggest that these numbers are much too high, and that this scale should adjust for height. Obviously a 5-foot man and a 6-foor man should not be expected to have the same waist size.
There are also many free programs available on websites where you can get a body fat estimate based on specific measurements. We have one on our website at www.keepcanadaslim.com. Go there right now and find out how you are doing. It takes only a minute. This estimate will give you a starting point should you decide you want to change the shape you’re in.
Men should aim for 11-19%, women 17-23%, going as high as 25% if they are post-menopausal. High level athletes and those on a serious muscle-building workout program may be lower, although women who drop below 15% often stop having periods, which doesn’t seem to be a sign of health to me.
In closing, it is unfair to medical doctors to expect them to be experts in prevention. Doctors treat disease. The key point Dr. Sharma was making is that these patients have no sign of heart disease. Their blood pressure and cholesterol levels are within normal limits. Therefore doctors should not be using the resources of the medical system – which is under tremendous financial pressure – to “treat” them.
Unfortunately the extension of that is if left alone, these weight issues may eventually contribute to measureable risk factors, and then the person will be gladly accepted as a patient!
From a wellness perspective, we’d like to suggest people adjust their lifestyle to one that will prevent weight gain – plus adopt a shopping, cooking and eating program that will improve their health.
But don’t expect to find that program through our doctors.
In closing – forget the BMI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
The Wellness Workplace: A Brave New World
If there is a brave new world on the frontier of our corporate consciousness it must surely be the land of employee wellness programs. Owners and managers worldwide are recognizing the connection between employee health and productivity, and therefore bottom-line profits, and yet very few companies are confidently embracing wellness options.
Perhaps part of the reason for that is the difficulty in relating nationwide costs directly to an individual employee, or individual workplace. Numerous studies have linked various illnesses and conditions with reduced productivity - also known as presenteeism, which can be defined as being present at your job but with reduced productivity because of your condition - and absenteeism, which of course is simply being absent from work because you are unwell. But what does that mean in real dollars in your workplace?
Estimates are that un-wellness directly costs the US economy $260 billion per year. If we assume a workforce of 100 million people this would be $2600 per person per year. One can expect similar figures on a percentage basis in countries throughout the Western world. Multiply that by the number of full-time employees in your company and you have a reasonable estimate of the real costs to you. This does not include interdependent losses, such as those that occur for instance when a department manager is absent, and dependent staff are less productive than they would be if he/she was on the job.
The top 11 health risks related to productivity are poor diet, high body mass index, high cholesterol, physical inactivity, excessive stress, overdue preventative visits, lack of emotional fulfillment, high blood pressure, tobacco use, diabetes or high blood glucose, and alcohol use.
So while we may know in our hearts that our employees would be more productive if they were healthier, as HR professionals we have difficulty evaluating and proposing an investment in this area in terms of its bottom-line benefit, and then choosing appropriate programs.
Fortunately this question has not escaped notice by researchers and today we have many well-designed studies that have applied actual numbers to wellness issues in a variety of occupations and age groups. For example, in a study published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine in 2007 the overweight were 32% more likely, the obese 61% more likely and the morbidly obese 118% more likely to miss a day of work than those without weight issues. These figures do not include workplace costs due to disability and early retirement.
You can find some of these studies on our website at www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=corporate or by doing a Google search.
On the other hand it doesn't take a rocket scientist to look around your office and realize that people who are stressed and depressed, overweight and with low energy, or just plain sick with a cold or the flu and are still at work are less productive than they would be if they were healthy.
So let's start with the given that healthier workers are more productive and see if we can design a workplace wellness program that makes sense both financially and physically. This could perhaps start with a budget. If unwellness is costing your company $2600 per person per year, perhaps an initial investment of 20% or $520 per person per year would be a reasonable starting point.
Given that wellness is a personal responsibility, and that not all employees require the same program I would recommend that you include a user pay portion if possible. For instance a matching 50% program would turn $520 into $1040. This user pay concept ensures buy-in by the participants and this buy-in ultimately determines the success of any program. It also helps target corporate funds toward areas of wellness that would be best received and therefore most appropriate as a starting point.
According to the Wellness Council of America (WELCOA), there are seven steps to a successful employee wellness program. They are as follows: 1. Capturing Senior Level Support; 2. Creating Cohesive Wellness Teams; 3. Collecting Data to Drive Health Efforts; 4. Crafting an Operating Plan; 5. Choosing Appropriate Interventions; 6. Creating a Supportive Environment; 7. Consistently Evaluating Outcomes.
The important thing if you are to lead your company to the brave new world is to get started. The size of your employee force will determine the complexity of your challenge. Don't try to impact every health risk at once. Start with one program and achieve a level of success before moving on to a second concern. Given that most HR people are not wellness experts, at some point you will need to reach out to professionals who can help you in these areas. Fortunately there are just as many wellness professionals looking to fill your needs as there are HR people with needs to fill.
Let's bridge that gap and get our people, our companies, our communities and ultimately our countries moving forward to a healthier more productive future.
Lee Fairbanks is the President of Keep Canada Slim Inc., in Hamilton, Ontario and can be contacted at www.keepcanadaslim.com, by emailing bigskinny@keepcanadaslim.com or by phone at 905-628-0279. Keep Canada Slim offers custom-designed corporate wellness programs for companies of all sizes.
Perhaps part of the reason for that is the difficulty in relating nationwide costs directly to an individual employee, or individual workplace. Numerous studies have linked various illnesses and conditions with reduced productivity - also known as presenteeism, which can be defined as being present at your job but with reduced productivity because of your condition - and absenteeism, which of course is simply being absent from work because you are unwell. But what does that mean in real dollars in your workplace?
Estimates are that un-wellness directly costs the US economy $260 billion per year. If we assume a workforce of 100 million people this would be $2600 per person per year. One can expect similar figures on a percentage basis in countries throughout the Western world. Multiply that by the number of full-time employees in your company and you have a reasonable estimate of the real costs to you. This does not include interdependent losses, such as those that occur for instance when a department manager is absent, and dependent staff are less productive than they would be if he/she was on the job.
The top 11 health risks related to productivity are poor diet, high body mass index, high cholesterol, physical inactivity, excessive stress, overdue preventative visits, lack of emotional fulfillment, high blood pressure, tobacco use, diabetes or high blood glucose, and alcohol use.
So while we may know in our hearts that our employees would be more productive if they were healthier, as HR professionals we have difficulty evaluating and proposing an investment in this area in terms of its bottom-line benefit, and then choosing appropriate programs.
Fortunately this question has not escaped notice by researchers and today we have many well-designed studies that have applied actual numbers to wellness issues in a variety of occupations and age groups. For example, in a study published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine in 2007 the overweight were 32% more likely, the obese 61% more likely and the morbidly obese 118% more likely to miss a day of work than those without weight issues. These figures do not include workplace costs due to disability and early retirement.
You can find some of these studies on our website at www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=corporate or by doing a Google search.
On the other hand it doesn't take a rocket scientist to look around your office and realize that people who are stressed and depressed, overweight and with low energy, or just plain sick with a cold or the flu and are still at work are less productive than they would be if they were healthy.
So let's start with the given that healthier workers are more productive and see if we can design a workplace wellness program that makes sense both financially and physically. This could perhaps start with a budget. If unwellness is costing your company $2600 per person per year, perhaps an initial investment of 20% or $520 per person per year would be a reasonable starting point.
Given that wellness is a personal responsibility, and that not all employees require the same program I would recommend that you include a user pay portion if possible. For instance a matching 50% program would turn $520 into $1040. This user pay concept ensures buy-in by the participants and this buy-in ultimately determines the success of any program. It also helps target corporate funds toward areas of wellness that would be best received and therefore most appropriate as a starting point.
According to the Wellness Council of America (WELCOA), there are seven steps to a successful employee wellness program. They are as follows: 1. Capturing Senior Level Support; 2. Creating Cohesive Wellness Teams; 3. Collecting Data to Drive Health Efforts; 4. Crafting an Operating Plan; 5. Choosing Appropriate Interventions; 6. Creating a Supportive Environment; 7. Consistently Evaluating Outcomes.
The important thing if you are to lead your company to the brave new world is to get started. The size of your employee force will determine the complexity of your challenge. Don't try to impact every health risk at once. Start with one program and achieve a level of success before moving on to a second concern. Given that most HR people are not wellness experts, at some point you will need to reach out to professionals who can help you in these areas. Fortunately there are just as many wellness professionals looking to fill your needs as there are HR people with needs to fill.
Let's bridge that gap and get our people, our companies, our communities and ultimately our countries moving forward to a healthier more productive future.
Lee Fairbanks is the President of Keep Canada Slim Inc., in Hamilton, Ontario and can be contacted at www.keepcanadaslim.com, by emailing bigskinny@keepcanadaslim.com or by phone at 905-628-0279. Keep Canada Slim offers custom-designed corporate wellness programs for companies of all sizes.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Recession Can Lead to Better Health
Good Time for Traditional Food Values
An economic recession is a great time to return to traditional food values. If you’re feeling the crunch financially you could save a lot of money on groceries while actually improving your health by cutting back on processed and packaged foods. And if you’re smart about your choices you can actually improve your health at the same time.
If you go through the store aisles you’ll find opportunities everywhere to save money. These savings can add up to hundreds and even thousands of dollars for a family over a period of months and years.
Some of the simplest strategies are to return to the lifestyle of our parents and grandparents. For instance rather than boxed processed cereals such as Frosted Flakes and Cheerios old favourites such as oatmeal offer superior health at about one third the price.
You can also save money on food by going on the Keep America / Keep Canada Slim weight loss program for another win-win. KAS is the lowest-priced complete weight loss program in North America at only $129.95 for the entire program of CDs, DVD, books and website support.
For more information go to http://www.keepamericaslim.com/.
Many of our most expensive foods are also high in fat and calories. A health-based weight loss program such as Keep America Slim will show you how to reduce the consumption of these choices, which will naturally save you money.
In the produce section, look for sale products. This week you might find broccoli and cucumbers for $.99 each but next week they are $1.99 and something else is on sale. Staple fruits such as bananas and bagged apples are less than $.99 a pound and provide tremendous nutritional value. More exotic fruits from tropical areas such as strawberries, grapes and oranges also go on sale even in the winter. It requires going to the store with a flexible shopping list, as opposed to simply buying the same things every week regardless of price.
It’s a great time to revisit the potato and to also eat more brown rice, basic starch products that provide a lot of energy per dollar. This is also a great time to endorse the highly recommended habit of reducing the portion size of animal protein products such as meat, chicken and fish which can be expensive, and eating larger portions of vegetables and starches which are much cheaper. Potatoes and rice both lend themselves to a variety of cooking options, such as baked, mashed, roasted and scalloped potatoes, or stir-fried rice with diced vegetables, teriyaki sauce and so on.
Sometimes frozen chicken and fish can be much less expensive than fresh, and purchasing store brands instead of name brands can save even more. Buy chicken with the skin on and bone in and remove the skin and bone yourself at home the way your parents would have. Beans and lentils also offer inexpensive high-quality protein sources as alternatives.
Frozen orange juice can usually be found for a dollar a can on sale, as opposed to $3-$4 for the same amount in a carton. Instead of buying bottled water buy a small carbon filter and make your own. A $7 Brita filter makes 150 L of bottled water with savings of about $50 compared to the equivalent number of 500 ml bottles.
It’s important not to sacrifice nutritional value when making these substitutions. There is a tendency to believe that good foods are all more expensive but this has never been true and is certainly not true today. There have always been healthy choices for people on a budget but sometimes it takes an economic crisis for people to re-evaluate their habits. Just don’t throw out the baby with the bathwater. For instance, I wouldn’t eat white bread no matter what the price difference. I will continue to use cold-pressed olive oil for cooking and salad dressing, even though there are cheaper oils. The loss of nutritional value is just too great.
This would be a great time to spend a little extra time in the kitchen making foods that you have been in the habit of purchasing. These would include such things as tomato sauces, stews, salad dressing and snacks. Make your own muffins and cookies. You could spend a few hours in the kitchen on the weekend and make enough of these for a week or more.
Keep America Slim includes a cookbook with 60 easy recipes to start you on your way. Go to our What's in the Package page for more info.
You should check your neighbourhood for alternatives to the mainstream grocery stores that you may be more familiar with. Bulk stores and dollar stores today have a lot of non-perishable goods at cheaper prices and grocery stores. This would include pasta, rice, coffee, tea and flour.
And speaking of coffee, the recession might actually be beneficial to some companies such as Dunkin’ Donuts. I see a lot of people switching from designer coffees at five dollars a crack and going back to DD. You can feed a family of four for a week for the same price as a designer coffee every day.
So remember, there is always a silver lining in every cloud. This recession may be just what you need to get you committed to a healthier lifestyle!
An economic recession is a great time to return to traditional food values. If you’re feeling the crunch financially you could save a lot of money on groceries while actually improving your health by cutting back on processed and packaged foods. And if you’re smart about your choices you can actually improve your health at the same time.
If you go through the store aisles you’ll find opportunities everywhere to save money. These savings can add up to hundreds and even thousands of dollars for a family over a period of months and years.
Some of the simplest strategies are to return to the lifestyle of our parents and grandparents. For instance rather than boxed processed cereals such as Frosted Flakes and Cheerios old favourites such as oatmeal offer superior health at about one third the price.
You can also save money on food by going on the Keep America / Keep Canada Slim weight loss program for another win-win. KAS is the lowest-priced complete weight loss program in North America at only $129.95 for the entire program of CDs, DVD, books and website support.
For more information go to http://www.keepamericaslim.com/.
Many of our most expensive foods are also high in fat and calories. A health-based weight loss program such as Keep America Slim will show you how to reduce the consumption of these choices, which will naturally save you money.
In the produce section, look for sale products. This week you might find broccoli and cucumbers for $.99 each but next week they are $1.99 and something else is on sale. Staple fruits such as bananas and bagged apples are less than $.99 a pound and provide tremendous nutritional value. More exotic fruits from tropical areas such as strawberries, grapes and oranges also go on sale even in the winter. It requires going to the store with a flexible shopping list, as opposed to simply buying the same things every week regardless of price.
It’s a great time to revisit the potato and to also eat more brown rice, basic starch products that provide a lot of energy per dollar. This is also a great time to endorse the highly recommended habit of reducing the portion size of animal protein products such as meat, chicken and fish which can be expensive, and eating larger portions of vegetables and starches which are much cheaper. Potatoes and rice both lend themselves to a variety of cooking options, such as baked, mashed, roasted and scalloped potatoes, or stir-fried rice with diced vegetables, teriyaki sauce and so on.
Sometimes frozen chicken and fish can be much less expensive than fresh, and purchasing store brands instead of name brands can save even more. Buy chicken with the skin on and bone in and remove the skin and bone yourself at home the way your parents would have. Beans and lentils also offer inexpensive high-quality protein sources as alternatives.
Frozen orange juice can usually be found for a dollar a can on sale, as opposed to $3-$4 for the same amount in a carton. Instead of buying bottled water buy a small carbon filter and make your own. A $7 Brita filter makes 150 L of bottled water with savings of about $50 compared to the equivalent number of 500 ml bottles.
It’s important not to sacrifice nutritional value when making these substitutions. There is a tendency to believe that good foods are all more expensive but this has never been true and is certainly not true today. There have always been healthy choices for people on a budget but sometimes it takes an economic crisis for people to re-evaluate their habits. Just don’t throw out the baby with the bathwater. For instance, I wouldn’t eat white bread no matter what the price difference. I will continue to use cold-pressed olive oil for cooking and salad dressing, even though there are cheaper oils. The loss of nutritional value is just too great.
This would be a great time to spend a little extra time in the kitchen making foods that you have been in the habit of purchasing. These would include such things as tomato sauces, stews, salad dressing and snacks. Make your own muffins and cookies. You could spend a few hours in the kitchen on the weekend and make enough of these for a week or more.
Keep America Slim includes a cookbook with 60 easy recipes to start you on your way. Go to our What's in the Package page for more info.
You should check your neighbourhood for alternatives to the mainstream grocery stores that you may be more familiar with. Bulk stores and dollar stores today have a lot of non-perishable goods at cheaper prices and grocery stores. This would include pasta, rice, coffee, tea and flour.
And speaking of coffee, the recession might actually be beneficial to some companies such as Dunkin’ Donuts. I see a lot of people switching from designer coffees at five dollars a crack and going back to DD. You can feed a family of four for a week for the same price as a designer coffee every day.
So remember, there is always a silver lining in every cloud. This recession may be just what you need to get you committed to a healthier lifestyle!
Monday, March 2, 2009
Low Calorie Diets = Low Fibre Diets = Increased Disease Risk: Doctor
Former Health Canada Advisor Warns Women: DON'T DIET
As many as four million Canadian women - and 40 million American women - who diet constantly to lose weight are increasing their risk of disease later in life warns a former Health Canada adviser.
Dr. George Grant owner of the Academy of Wellness in Toronto www.academyofwellness.com says his client data indicates that the majority of Canadians who diet do not consume enough fiber on a daily basis, and are also deficient in many key nutrients.
"Most Canadians are only having one bowel movement per day,” explains Dr. Grant. "This is very unhealthy in the long-term. People should have on average three if they are eating three meals per day. This is essential to maintain intestinal health and will help reduce the incidence of many diseases later in life.”
Dr. Grant points out that low fiber intake increases the likelihood of many diseases including heart disease, diabetes, cancer of the colon, breast, ovaries and uterus, diverticulitis, kidney stones and gallbladder disease. Dr. Grant warns that Canada will face a huge increase in these degenerative diseases as the next generation of Canadians - those obsessed with dieting - reach old age.
“In my work as a health analyst across Canada I see many, many people consistently under eating in a vain attempt to lose weight and keep it off," says Dr. Grant. "This starvation approach to life not only doesn't work for weight loss but it actually leaves people dramatically deficient in most essential minerals and vitamins as well as fiber," he said.
According to the National Eating Disorder Information Centre (NEDIC) 70% of Canadian women over the age of 20 are currently on diets, and 40% are yo-yo dieters, constantly losing weight and gaining it back.
Dr. Grant recommends the Keep Canada Slim weight loss program www.keepcanadaslim.com to his clients. This program is shipped worldwide.
"The Keep Canada Slim program recommends higher levels of calories than any other commercial program in Canada, and yet still delivers weight loss results. Most Canadians trying to lose weight are eating so little that they increase their risk of disease. It is imperative that we stop Canadians from living on low calorie diets," said Dr. Grant.
According to Dr. Grant most overweight women should not eat less than 1450 calories per day and men should aim for a minimum of 1850 calories per day.
“Obese people should eat even higher levels of calories,” he suggests. “Overweight people should aim to create no more than a 500 calorie deficit based on their daily maintenance levels while obese people should aim for no more than a 1000 calorie a day deficit.”
Typical commercial diets suggest calorie levels as low as 500 calories per day, ranging to a high of perhaps 1200 calories for women and 1500 calories for men. This creates a calorie gap of between 1500 and 2500 calories per day for most people. Because of the body’s response to the starvation nature of these diets 95% of the people who lose weight gain it back.
Dr. Grant says it is impossible to consume adequate levels of fiber and nutrients at these levels.
For a list of high-fiber foods click here
As many as four million Canadian women - and 40 million American women - who diet constantly to lose weight are increasing their risk of disease later in life warns a former Health Canada adviser.
Dr. George Grant owner of the Academy of Wellness in Toronto www.academyofwellness.com says his client data indicates that the majority of Canadians who diet do not consume enough fiber on a daily basis, and are also deficient in many key nutrients.
"Most Canadians are only having one bowel movement per day,” explains Dr. Grant. "This is very unhealthy in the long-term. People should have on average three if they are eating three meals per day. This is essential to maintain intestinal health and will help reduce the incidence of many diseases later in life.”
Dr. Grant points out that low fiber intake increases the likelihood of many diseases including heart disease, diabetes, cancer of the colon, breast, ovaries and uterus, diverticulitis, kidney stones and gallbladder disease. Dr. Grant warns that Canada will face a huge increase in these degenerative diseases as the next generation of Canadians - those obsessed with dieting - reach old age.
“In my work as a health analyst across Canada I see many, many people consistently under eating in a vain attempt to lose weight and keep it off," says Dr. Grant. "This starvation approach to life not only doesn't work for weight loss but it actually leaves people dramatically deficient in most essential minerals and vitamins as well as fiber," he said.
According to the National Eating Disorder Information Centre (NEDIC) 70% of Canadian women over the age of 20 are currently on diets, and 40% are yo-yo dieters, constantly losing weight and gaining it back.
Dr. Grant recommends the Keep Canada Slim weight loss program www.keepcanadaslim.com to his clients. This program is shipped worldwide.
"The Keep Canada Slim program recommends higher levels of calories than any other commercial program in Canada, and yet still delivers weight loss results. Most Canadians trying to lose weight are eating so little that they increase their risk of disease. It is imperative that we stop Canadians from living on low calorie diets," said Dr. Grant.
According to Dr. Grant most overweight women should not eat less than 1450 calories per day and men should aim for a minimum of 1850 calories per day.
“Obese people should eat even higher levels of calories,” he suggests. “Overweight people should aim to create no more than a 500 calorie deficit based on their daily maintenance levels while obese people should aim for no more than a 1000 calorie a day deficit.”
Typical commercial diets suggest calorie levels as low as 500 calories per day, ranging to a high of perhaps 1200 calories for women and 1500 calories for men. This creates a calorie gap of between 1500 and 2500 calories per day for most people. Because of the body’s response to the starvation nature of these diets 95% of the people who lose weight gain it back.
Dr. Grant says it is impossible to consume adequate levels of fiber and nutrients at these levels.
For a list of high-fiber foods click here
Thursday, February 26, 2009
CMAJ calls on government to regulate commercial weight loss programs
Regulation would discourage innovation, limit solutions
While I share the authors’ concerns about misleading advertising claims by commercial weight loss providers, attempting to have governments regulate the industry would be a huge mistake.
To see the CMAJ editorial go to http://www.cmaj.ca
The first challenge to the proposal would be to establish an accreditation program void of political agendas and special interests [i.e. pharmaceutical companies] while at the same time encouraging innovation and new solutions. Given that no existing major private company offering or medically approved program can be said to meet a realistic criteria of long-term success, limiting entry into this field by requiring new participants to abide by dated and flawed principles would doom our ‘ever-growing’ population to a lifetime of the same end result-getting fatter and less healthy.
The second challenge is the sheer scope of the proposition. The CMAJ editorial focuses on weight loss products, but this is a small part of the $5billion Canadians spend trying to address this health challenge. Outrageous weight loss claims are also made throughout the exercise industry, and recently we have seen the food industry join the fray as the dairy industry and high-fibre food products industry have begun making weight loss claims for their products.
For weight control without misleading claims go to www.keepcanadaslim.com.
Much of this money is also spent on books, CDs, DVDs, and website programs which also make various claims. And finally the media itself is constantly reinforcing stereotypes of dieting such as The Biggest Loser television show, and ongoing coverage of anyone anywhere who achieves significant weight loss – no matter how temporary or what the long-term health costs may be. Does the CMA propose the government regulate all of these industries since they all contribute to the problem? And since much of this industry originates in the US, regulation by Canadian governments would have little overall impact.
In terms of diet products and their claims we already have substantial regulation in place. What is required is a strengthening of these regulations and perhaps a review to reflect more accurately a consumer protective stance. The supplement industry recently won the right to make limited claims about the benefits of their products after an exhaustive multiyear battle. All products approved for sale in Canada are proven safe when taken in recommended dosages. There is no value in wasting energy trying to reverse this position. Ephedra, mentioned in the editorial as having “fatal consequences” is illegal in Canada as I'm sure the authors know. And medical supervision of a very low calorie (VLC) diet offers no benefit over a medically supervised VLC diets. Both versions are unsafe and unhealthy.
If a consumer looks carefully at these outrageous claims they should find an adjoining statement that says "results not typical" or "results may vary". It may be useful to change labeling legislation to require these consumer warnings to be larger and more prominent, perhaps in the same type size as the claims themselves.
In closing, I would suggest the CMA and it's members open its doors to the many innovators, entrepreneurs, researchers and private companies that would like to help find a solution to weight gain and obesity, rather than expending energy fighting a massive battle that even if won, might provide no benefit to those in need. Let's do a better job of educating consumers so they are better able to recognize misleading advertising claims.
Let's become "pro-something" rather than "against something".
For a complete list of Keep America / Keep Canada Slim newsletters go to http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=archives
While I share the authors’ concerns about misleading advertising claims by commercial weight loss providers, attempting to have governments regulate the industry would be a huge mistake.
To see the CMAJ editorial go to http://www.cmaj.ca
The first challenge to the proposal would be to establish an accreditation program void of political agendas and special interests [i.e. pharmaceutical companies] while at the same time encouraging innovation and new solutions. Given that no existing major private company offering or medically approved program can be said to meet a realistic criteria of long-term success, limiting entry into this field by requiring new participants to abide by dated and flawed principles would doom our ‘ever-growing’ population to a lifetime of the same end result-getting fatter and less healthy.
The second challenge is the sheer scope of the proposition. The CMAJ editorial focuses on weight loss products, but this is a small part of the $5billion Canadians spend trying to address this health challenge. Outrageous weight loss claims are also made throughout the exercise industry, and recently we have seen the food industry join the fray as the dairy industry and high-fibre food products industry have begun making weight loss claims for their products.
For weight control without misleading claims go to www.keepcanadaslim.com.
Much of this money is also spent on books, CDs, DVDs, and website programs which also make various claims. And finally the media itself is constantly reinforcing stereotypes of dieting such as The Biggest Loser television show, and ongoing coverage of anyone anywhere who achieves significant weight loss – no matter how temporary or what the long-term health costs may be. Does the CMA propose the government regulate all of these industries since they all contribute to the problem? And since much of this industry originates in the US, regulation by Canadian governments would have little overall impact.
In terms of diet products and their claims we already have substantial regulation in place. What is required is a strengthening of these regulations and perhaps a review to reflect more accurately a consumer protective stance. The supplement industry recently won the right to make limited claims about the benefits of their products after an exhaustive multiyear battle. All products approved for sale in Canada are proven safe when taken in recommended dosages. There is no value in wasting energy trying to reverse this position. Ephedra, mentioned in the editorial as having “fatal consequences” is illegal in Canada as I'm sure the authors know. And medical supervision of a very low calorie (VLC) diet offers no benefit over a medically supervised VLC diets. Both versions are unsafe and unhealthy.
If a consumer looks carefully at these outrageous claims they should find an adjoining statement that says "results not typical" or "results may vary". It may be useful to change labeling legislation to require these consumer warnings to be larger and more prominent, perhaps in the same type size as the claims themselves.
In closing, I would suggest the CMA and it's members open its doors to the many innovators, entrepreneurs, researchers and private companies that would like to help find a solution to weight gain and obesity, rather than expending energy fighting a massive battle that even if won, might provide no benefit to those in need. Let's do a better job of educating consumers so they are better able to recognize misleading advertising claims.
Let's become "pro-something" rather than "against something".
For a complete list of Keep America / Keep Canada Slim newsletters go to http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=archives
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Exercise & Dieting: Why it Fails so Often
Exercise Without Proper Eating will Fail
Let me say it right up front – Exercise is an add-on to a successful weight control program, not a foundation. In fact exercise actually complicates your program if you haven’t fixed your eating habits first. Allow me to explain.
If you ask 100 people the key to weightloss you can expect 97 of them to say “eat less and exercise more.” But if you’ve had a weight problem for any length of time you know that this equation doesn’t always work. In truth, it generally only works the first or second time you do it. Each time you re-commit to an exercise program you have probably found it less and less successful.
In fact, many of our clients are stuck on a permanent plateau while ‘eating less’ and continuing to ‘exercise more’.
For more about our program go to www.keepamericaslim.com
The simple explanation is that you are not prepared nutritionally to support exercise. Most people blindly head to the gym, sign up for some aerobics courses or jump on the treadmill and assume that the fat will simply slide off their body. The truth is the new demands you are placing on your body require a new approach to eating, as well as exercise.
Now don’t get me wrong, there are many great reasons to exercise, so if you want to exercise for all the right reasons, please go ahead. However if you make it the foundation of your weight control you will eventually fail. Injuries, pregnancy, a change of job, new romance, lack of motivation – there are any number of reasons why people stop exercising. However none of us will ever stop eating. The foundation of any successful long-term weight control program is learning how to shop, cook and eat properly. Only when you have established that foundation should you add exercise.
But there’s more. Exercise in combination with a low-calorie diet can actually undermine your program – not enhance it. This is because it puts you even deeper into Starvation Metabolism.
Starvation metabolism is our genetic response to under-eating. Our body shifts from burning fat for energy to preserving fat for the future. We begin to burn muscle for energy and store fat. Eventually you stop dieting but the body is now trained to store calories so you gain back all you lost – and usually more.
Consider this typical scenario: A 160-pound woman who wants to be 130 pounds needs to eat a minimum of 1350 calories for safe weight loss, but she starts a diet, limiting herself to 800 calories per day. This automatically puts her into starvation. Then she adds exercise.
Let’s say she does 45 minutes on a treadmill, burning about 300 calories. Since she is on a diet she doesn’t want to eat more food, so this new demand for energy puts her even further into starvation. Even if she loses weight, one-third of the loss will be muscle. Her body will fight against the loss of more body fat – essential for survival during starvation - guaranteeing a plateau at best and a yo-yo response at worst.
So what to do? First, choose muscle building exercises instead of aerobic exercise. This has the ability to restore muscle lost from previous dieting. Second, if you exercise, you must eat more food. In the Keep America / Keep Canada Slim program we recommend adding 75 per cent of the calories burned back into your diet. In the above case, this means an additional 225 calories, taking her up to 1575 calories. Then she would have safe permanent weight loss and get the full benefits of her exercise program.
Unfortunately, we don’t see this happening in North America.
In the Keep America / Keep Canada Slim program we typically see a loss of 10% of a person’s bodyfat in six weeks without exercise. This is more than most people can achieve at the gym without a properly balanced food plan. So if you are planning a weightloss program, start with food first.
Keep America / Keep Canada Slim is a comprehensive weight control program sold through the website, www.keepamericaslim.com and through independent consultation offices across Canada.
Let me say it right up front – Exercise is an add-on to a successful weight control program, not a foundation. In fact exercise actually complicates your program if you haven’t fixed your eating habits first. Allow me to explain.
If you ask 100 people the key to weightloss you can expect 97 of them to say “eat less and exercise more.” But if you’ve had a weight problem for any length of time you know that this equation doesn’t always work. In truth, it generally only works the first or second time you do it. Each time you re-commit to an exercise program you have probably found it less and less successful.
In fact, many of our clients are stuck on a permanent plateau while ‘eating less’ and continuing to ‘exercise more’.
For more about our program go to www.keepamericaslim.com
The simple explanation is that you are not prepared nutritionally to support exercise. Most people blindly head to the gym, sign up for some aerobics courses or jump on the treadmill and assume that the fat will simply slide off their body. The truth is the new demands you are placing on your body require a new approach to eating, as well as exercise.
Now don’t get me wrong, there are many great reasons to exercise, so if you want to exercise for all the right reasons, please go ahead. However if you make it the foundation of your weight control you will eventually fail. Injuries, pregnancy, a change of job, new romance, lack of motivation – there are any number of reasons why people stop exercising. However none of us will ever stop eating. The foundation of any successful long-term weight control program is learning how to shop, cook and eat properly. Only when you have established that foundation should you add exercise.
But there’s more. Exercise in combination with a low-calorie diet can actually undermine your program – not enhance it. This is because it puts you even deeper into Starvation Metabolism.
Starvation metabolism is our genetic response to under-eating. Our body shifts from burning fat for energy to preserving fat for the future. We begin to burn muscle for energy and store fat. Eventually you stop dieting but the body is now trained to store calories so you gain back all you lost – and usually more.
Consider this typical scenario: A 160-pound woman who wants to be 130 pounds needs to eat a minimum of 1350 calories for safe weight loss, but she starts a diet, limiting herself to 800 calories per day. This automatically puts her into starvation. Then she adds exercise.
Let’s say she does 45 minutes on a treadmill, burning about 300 calories. Since she is on a diet she doesn’t want to eat more food, so this new demand for energy puts her even further into starvation. Even if she loses weight, one-third of the loss will be muscle. Her body will fight against the loss of more body fat – essential for survival during starvation - guaranteeing a plateau at best and a yo-yo response at worst.
So what to do? First, choose muscle building exercises instead of aerobic exercise. This has the ability to restore muscle lost from previous dieting. Second, if you exercise, you must eat more food. In the Keep America / Keep Canada Slim program we recommend adding 75 per cent of the calories burned back into your diet. In the above case, this means an additional 225 calories, taking her up to 1575 calories. Then she would have safe permanent weight loss and get the full benefits of her exercise program.
Unfortunately, we don’t see this happening in North America.
In the Keep America / Keep Canada Slim program we typically see a loss of 10% of a person’s bodyfat in six weeks without exercise. This is more than most people can achieve at the gym without a properly balanced food plan. So if you are planning a weightloss program, start with food first.
Keep America / Keep Canada Slim is a comprehensive weight control program sold through the website, www.keepamericaslim.com and through independent consultation offices across Canada.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Is Your Job Making You Fat?
Making Work, work for you
As most people know, many jobs require long periods of physical inactivity, often sitting at a desk for hours at a time. But lack of activity is not the whole story on why your job is making you fat.
Other careers require extended periods of concentrated efforts which dictate your day’s schedule, causing you to skip meals. Believe it or not, this work habit will also cause you to gain weight.
In our consulting program we often hear these explanations as to why people can’t eat properly during the day: “I’m too busy at work to stop and eat,” or “I’m not allowed to take a break between lunch and the end of the day.”
For more information about our program go to http://www.keepamericaslim.com/.
In both cases, their job or career is making them fat.
Consider this: a person can gain weight while eating 1500 calories per day; the same person can lose weight while eating 1500 calories a day – without any change in their activity.
The secret is in balancing meals – when you eat and how much you eat at each meal.
Let’s say at 7:30 a.m. you eat a typical breakfast of cereal with milk and black coffee. You might consume 200 calories. If you have a quick lunch at 12:30, maybe a salad with fat-free dressing, yogurt and an apple; or soup and half a sandwich; you might eat 300 calories there. Then you get home after a 60-minute commute, take an hour to settle and make dinner, then eat a 1,000-calorie meal at 7:30.
Because you have eaten so little during the day, your body is in ‘starvation’ mode by dinner time, something we explain in detail in our program. In starvation, you will store pretty much all of that dinner. In addition, you can’t burn off 1,000 calories before your next meal, so some of that storage is still there when you have breakfast the next day.
Compare that routine to this one: You eat a little more for breakfast – maybe add an egg and hit 300 calories. At 10:30 you have a low-fat muffin with low-fat cream cheese and an apple with your coffee – another 300 calories. At 3 o’clock you eat a whole wheat chicken wrap for another 300 calories.
When you get home, you’re not that hungry, so you have a small plate of pasta with tomato sauce and some fresh chopped veggies at 7 p.m., adding another 300 calories to your day. About 10 o’clock you feel like a snack so you have that last piece of apple pie you’ve been saving for another 300 calories.
The difference with this meal plan is that it has kept your metabolism moving at a steady pace all day. You never go into starvation metabolism, so you don’t store any of it.
Think of your metabolism as a fire. If you feed it wood regularly it will burn steadily, consuming the fuel, producing energy and leaving a little ash. On the other hand if you cut back on wood for extended periods of time the flame will die down. Then you dump three times the regular amount of wood on it and the flame is suffocated, causing incomplete combustion and leaving a lot of wood only partially burned.
That’s the way it is with your metabolism. Feed the flames a steady flow of fuel and you will not store it. This is one of the key strategies we teach in the Keep Canada Slim program
Keep Canada / Keep America Slim is a comprehensive weight control program sold through the website, http://www.keepamericaslim.com/ and through independent consultation offices across Canada.
As most people know, many jobs require long periods of physical inactivity, often sitting at a desk for hours at a time. But lack of activity is not the whole story on why your job is making you fat.
Other careers require extended periods of concentrated efforts which dictate your day’s schedule, causing you to skip meals. Believe it or not, this work habit will also cause you to gain weight.
In our consulting program we often hear these explanations as to why people can’t eat properly during the day: “I’m too busy at work to stop and eat,” or “I’m not allowed to take a break between lunch and the end of the day.”
For more information about our program go to http://www.keepamericaslim.com/.
In both cases, their job or career is making them fat.
Consider this: a person can gain weight while eating 1500 calories per day; the same person can lose weight while eating 1500 calories a day – without any change in their activity.
The secret is in balancing meals – when you eat and how much you eat at each meal.
Let’s say at 7:30 a.m. you eat a typical breakfast of cereal with milk and black coffee. You might consume 200 calories. If you have a quick lunch at 12:30, maybe a salad with fat-free dressing, yogurt and an apple; or soup and half a sandwich; you might eat 300 calories there. Then you get home after a 60-minute commute, take an hour to settle and make dinner, then eat a 1,000-calorie meal at 7:30.
Because you have eaten so little during the day, your body is in ‘starvation’ mode by dinner time, something we explain in detail in our program. In starvation, you will store pretty much all of that dinner. In addition, you can’t burn off 1,000 calories before your next meal, so some of that storage is still there when you have breakfast the next day.
Compare that routine to this one: You eat a little more for breakfast – maybe add an egg and hit 300 calories. At 10:30 you have a low-fat muffin with low-fat cream cheese and an apple with your coffee – another 300 calories. At 3 o’clock you eat a whole wheat chicken wrap for another 300 calories.
When you get home, you’re not that hungry, so you have a small plate of pasta with tomato sauce and some fresh chopped veggies at 7 p.m., adding another 300 calories to your day. About 10 o’clock you feel like a snack so you have that last piece of apple pie you’ve been saving for another 300 calories.
The difference with this meal plan is that it has kept your metabolism moving at a steady pace all day. You never go into starvation metabolism, so you don’t store any of it.
Think of your metabolism as a fire. If you feed it wood regularly it will burn steadily, consuming the fuel, producing energy and leaving a little ash. On the other hand if you cut back on wood for extended periods of time the flame will die down. Then you dump three times the regular amount of wood on it and the flame is suffocated, causing incomplete combustion and leaving a lot of wood only partially burned.
That’s the way it is with your metabolism. Feed the flames a steady flow of fuel and you will not store it. This is one of the key strategies we teach in the Keep Canada Slim program
Keep Canada / Keep America Slim is a comprehensive weight control program sold through the website, http://www.keepamericaslim.com/ and through independent consultation offices across Canada.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Taking the Yo out of the Yo-Yo
Why diets don't work and how to create a lifestyle that does!
Ask 100 people the key to weight loss and 97 will say “eat less food." In our Keep Canada / Keep America Slim consulting program, we find that 97% of our clients are actually already eating too little to have permanent success. Until you clearly understand and act on this apparent contradiction you will never gain control of your weight.
It’s true that people initially gain weight because they eat too much, but losing weight and keeping it off is more complicated than simply starving yourself. And each time you go that route you make future attempts at weight control more difficult.
For more detailed info go to our website at http://www.keepamericaslim.com/.
Suppose you need 2000 calories a day to support your life’s activities, but you eat 2200 calories. You would store 200 calories each day. Since 3600 calories equals one pound, you would gain a pound every 18 days. Do this for a year and you have gained 20 pounds. Consider that half a large muffin is 200 calories and you can see how easy it is to gain weight.
So you go on a diet. Most commercial programs average 800 calories per day, so at this rate your body will burn 1200 calories from storage. This results in weight loss.
However, 800 calories is less than your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) – the minimum number of calories you need to simply exist. You are actually starving and your body reacts by metabolizing muscle for energy. This is part of our genetic programming, and dates back to our days as cavemen when food was scarce. During periods of food shortage, our bodies adapted for survival by storing fat, which protects inner organs and helps maintain body temperature, and utilizing muscle mass for energy. On a low-calorie diet up to one-third of the weight lost is muscle. This includes the muscles of the heart and other internal organs. (Anorexics often die of heart failure because they have lost so much heart muscle).
Muscle burns calories even at rest, so when you lose muscle through dieting you reduce your body's need for calories. Going back to our example, you would now need perhaps 1800 calories per day because you have less muscle. Resume your normal eating habits (2200 calories) and you are storing 400 calories per day and gaining weight at twice the previous rate. Soon you have gained back all the weight.
So you diet again, eating 800 calories a day. This time you lose a little slower, 1000 calories per day (1800-800), but eventually reach your weight goal. Again, one-third of the weight lost is muscle.
Now your caloric requirement has been reduced to 1600 calories per day and the weight comes back faster.
What’s worse is that the weight you gained back is all fat, so your body fat percentage begins to increase, going from a healthy range of 11-19% (men) or 17-25% (women) to 30, 40, 50% or more. And this excess body fat and muscle loss is the foundation of almost all degenerative diseases, from heart disease to many cancers, diabetes, osteoporosis and so on.
The more diets you go on, the fatter you become! Don’t believe me? Talk to the fattest people you know and ask them to tell you their history. They will tell you they have been on “every diet” but they get fatter and fatter each time they stop. These diets are all based on the 4 Myths of Dieting. To learn more about these myths go to
http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=myths.
So next time you decide to lose weight be sure to eat more than your Basal Metabolic requirements. This varies for everyone. Start at 1200 calories for a woman who wants to be 100 pounds, and increase by 50 calories for every 10 pounds of goal weight. For a man, start at 1500 calories to reach 130 pounds and add 75 calories for every 10 pounds of goal weight.
Keep Canada Slim is a comprehensive weight control program sold through the website, http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/ and through independent consultation offices across Canada.
Ask 100 people the key to weight loss and 97 will say “eat less food." In our Keep Canada / Keep America Slim consulting program, we find that 97% of our clients are actually already eating too little to have permanent success. Until you clearly understand and act on this apparent contradiction you will never gain control of your weight.
It’s true that people initially gain weight because they eat too much, but losing weight and keeping it off is more complicated than simply starving yourself. And each time you go that route you make future attempts at weight control more difficult.
For more detailed info go to our website at http://www.keepamericaslim.com/.
Suppose you need 2000 calories a day to support your life’s activities, but you eat 2200 calories. You would store 200 calories each day. Since 3600 calories equals one pound, you would gain a pound every 18 days. Do this for a year and you have gained 20 pounds. Consider that half a large muffin is 200 calories and you can see how easy it is to gain weight.
So you go on a diet. Most commercial programs average 800 calories per day, so at this rate your body will burn 1200 calories from storage. This results in weight loss.
However, 800 calories is less than your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) – the minimum number of calories you need to simply exist. You are actually starving and your body reacts by metabolizing muscle for energy. This is part of our genetic programming, and dates back to our days as cavemen when food was scarce. During periods of food shortage, our bodies adapted for survival by storing fat, which protects inner organs and helps maintain body temperature, and utilizing muscle mass for energy. On a low-calorie diet up to one-third of the weight lost is muscle. This includes the muscles of the heart and other internal organs. (Anorexics often die of heart failure because they have lost so much heart muscle).
Muscle burns calories even at rest, so when you lose muscle through dieting you reduce your body's need for calories. Going back to our example, you would now need perhaps 1800 calories per day because you have less muscle. Resume your normal eating habits (2200 calories) and you are storing 400 calories per day and gaining weight at twice the previous rate. Soon you have gained back all the weight.
So you diet again, eating 800 calories a day. This time you lose a little slower, 1000 calories per day (1800-800), but eventually reach your weight goal. Again, one-third of the weight lost is muscle.
Now your caloric requirement has been reduced to 1600 calories per day and the weight comes back faster.
What’s worse is that the weight you gained back is all fat, so your body fat percentage begins to increase, going from a healthy range of 11-19% (men) or 17-25% (women) to 30, 40, 50% or more. And this excess body fat and muscle loss is the foundation of almost all degenerative diseases, from heart disease to many cancers, diabetes, osteoporosis and so on.
The more diets you go on, the fatter you become! Don’t believe me? Talk to the fattest people you know and ask them to tell you their history. They will tell you they have been on “every diet” but they get fatter and fatter each time they stop. These diets are all based on the 4 Myths of Dieting. To learn more about these myths go to
http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=myths.
So next time you decide to lose weight be sure to eat more than your Basal Metabolic requirements. This varies for everyone. Start at 1200 calories for a woman who wants to be 100 pounds, and increase by 50 calories for every 10 pounds of goal weight. For a man, start at 1500 calories to reach 130 pounds and add 75 calories for every 10 pounds of goal weight.
Keep Canada Slim is a comprehensive weight control program sold through the website, http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/ and through independent consultation offices across Canada.
Monday, February 9, 2009
The Magic Secret to Weight Loss - The Four Myths of Dieting
The 4 Myths of Dieting
Mention weight loss at any social gathering and everyone has an opinion to offer and a ready audience to listen. With 71% of Americans and 61% of Canadians overweight, people are always looking for the magic secret – the one thing that will instantly give them a solution to their lifetime of weight control challenges.
In truth, successful weight control starts by understanding why your efforts have failed so often in the past and then choosing a different approach. Chances are very high (90 per cent according to the Canadian Obesity Network) that you have lost weight in the past but gained it back – and usually more than you lost. Many people have done this several times. It’s called Yo-Yo Dieting.
Most people simply try the same approach every year, and get fatter and fatter because of it.
Many people today understand that success comes from a ‘lifestyle’ approach, but then turn around and choose a diet as their ‘lifestyle’, proving that they don’t really understand the difference at all.
To have long-term success and keep the weight off, you must avoid following the Four Myths of Dieting. How many of these do you believe?
To download your copy of the 4 Myths of Dieting go to http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=myths
Myth # 1: You must eat less to lose weight. Eat less than what? Ninety-seven per cent of people trying to lose weight are already currently under-eating. If you eat less than your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) requirements you will undermine your metabolism as you lose weight, then rebound once you are off the diet. Your BMR requirements are the minimum calorie level for basic metabolic function, i.e. if you are sleeping 24 hours per day. This is generally about 10 calories per day for each pound of your goal weight. Eating less than this causes the body to switch to ‘Starvation Metabolism’ and metabolize muscle while storing fat. Most people diet on between 800 and 1200 calories per day. This means their goal weight would be between 80 and 120 pounds. I think you can see why this equation doesn’t work.
Myth # 2: You must exercise more to lose weight. Exercise is an add-on, not a foundation of weight loss. If you make exercise the foundation of your weight control program sooner or later it will fail. Injuries, family situations, illness, lack of motivation, there are many reasons why people inevitably cut back on exercise. You must understand food to have permanent control. You must also understand food to have a successful exercise program. You need to eat more food on days that you are exercising to avoid yo-yo diet metabolism. Most people don’t do that. If you have tried exercise you have probably already experienced some of these drawbacks and therefore know that this is true.
Myth # 3: Faster weightloss is always better. Your body can only lose weight safely and permanently at a certain rate, usually 1-2 pounds per week. Faster weight loss can only be achieved through starvation (low-calorie) dieting or artificial stimulants. Both undermine your health and metabolism and make this weight loss temporary.
Myth # 4: Measuring pounds lost is the true measure of success. Your body is made up of six kinds of weight. These are fat, muscle, organs, bone, water and fecal matter. If you are only measuring pounds, you could be losing healthy weight as well as fat. Anorexics are often clinically obese when they die, and can die of heart failure because they have lost so much heart muscle tissue through starvation dieting. You’ve been doing much the same thing on diets. Post-menopausal women can lose up to 3% of their bone density in six months on a low-calorie diet. The weight you want to lose is bodyfat, so start measuring that. Healthy men should be between 11-19% and women between 17-25%. High performance male athletes may be lower.
Keep Canada / Keep America Slim is a comprehensive weight control program sold through the website, www.keepamericaslim.com and through independent consultation offices across Canada.
Mention weight loss at any social gathering and everyone has an opinion to offer and a ready audience to listen. With 71% of Americans and 61% of Canadians overweight, people are always looking for the magic secret – the one thing that will instantly give them a solution to their lifetime of weight control challenges.
In truth, successful weight control starts by understanding why your efforts have failed so often in the past and then choosing a different approach. Chances are very high (90 per cent according to the Canadian Obesity Network) that you have lost weight in the past but gained it back – and usually more than you lost. Many people have done this several times. It’s called Yo-Yo Dieting.
Most people simply try the same approach every year, and get fatter and fatter because of it.
Many people today understand that success comes from a ‘lifestyle’ approach, but then turn around and choose a diet as their ‘lifestyle’, proving that they don’t really understand the difference at all.
To have long-term success and keep the weight off, you must avoid following the Four Myths of Dieting. How many of these do you believe?
To download your copy of the 4 Myths of Dieting go to http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=myths
Myth # 1: You must eat less to lose weight. Eat less than what? Ninety-seven per cent of people trying to lose weight are already currently under-eating. If you eat less than your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) requirements you will undermine your metabolism as you lose weight, then rebound once you are off the diet. Your BMR requirements are the minimum calorie level for basic metabolic function, i.e. if you are sleeping 24 hours per day. This is generally about 10 calories per day for each pound of your goal weight. Eating less than this causes the body to switch to ‘Starvation Metabolism’ and metabolize muscle while storing fat. Most people diet on between 800 and 1200 calories per day. This means their goal weight would be between 80 and 120 pounds. I think you can see why this equation doesn’t work.
Myth # 2: You must exercise more to lose weight. Exercise is an add-on, not a foundation of weight loss. If you make exercise the foundation of your weight control program sooner or later it will fail. Injuries, family situations, illness, lack of motivation, there are many reasons why people inevitably cut back on exercise. You must understand food to have permanent control. You must also understand food to have a successful exercise program. You need to eat more food on days that you are exercising to avoid yo-yo diet metabolism. Most people don’t do that. If you have tried exercise you have probably already experienced some of these drawbacks and therefore know that this is true.
Myth # 3: Faster weightloss is always better. Your body can only lose weight safely and permanently at a certain rate, usually 1-2 pounds per week. Faster weight loss can only be achieved through starvation (low-calorie) dieting or artificial stimulants. Both undermine your health and metabolism and make this weight loss temporary.
Myth # 4: Measuring pounds lost is the true measure of success. Your body is made up of six kinds of weight. These are fat, muscle, organs, bone, water and fecal matter. If you are only measuring pounds, you could be losing healthy weight as well as fat. Anorexics are often clinically obese when they die, and can die of heart failure because they have lost so much heart muscle tissue through starvation dieting. You’ve been doing much the same thing on diets. Post-menopausal women can lose up to 3% of their bone density in six months on a low-calorie diet. The weight you want to lose is bodyfat, so start measuring that. Healthy men should be between 11-19% and women between 17-25%. High performance male athletes may be lower.
Keep Canada / Keep America Slim is a comprehensive weight control program sold through the website, www.keepamericaslim.com and through independent consultation offices across Canada.
Friday, February 6, 2009
The Truth about Ghrelin
Advice: Eat before you shop for groceries
You may have read the article or seen a report on television recently about a so-called breakthrough in which Canadian researchers at McGill University have identified the fact that a hormone called ghrelin seems to cause people to overeat. Let me try to answer questions you may have on this issue.
Ghrelin as we mention in the Keep Canada / Keep America Slim materials is only one of a number of hormones that impact our appetite, satiety, and food metabolism. It is no more or no less important than any of the others. These other hormones include insulin, serotonin, leptin, cortisol, dopamine and others. Learn more about our program at http://www.keepamericaslim.com/.
Each one has a role to play in telling us when to eat and when to stop eating and also in helping us utilize food. When your body and your metabolism is in balance these hormones are in balance and do their job successfully. Alternatively if these hormones are out of balance your eating and fat-storing habits will be negatively affected.
In the case of ghrelin this hormone is created in our stomach and tells us that it's time to eat. Without ghrelin we might go days without food. This would not be healthy.
The articles about ghrelin, in the typical unbalanced media perspective, suggest that in the future we might have a drug that could control our ghrelin levels so that we don't want to eat. The concept would be that this drug would help us control ourselves while surrounded with all the food choices we have in the modern world. The underlying analysis is that overweight people have no self-control and are constantly gorging themselves on whatever foods pass their line of vision, apparently because of ghrelin gone wild.
All of this is wrong on several counts. First off as we know the vast majority of North Americans have tremendous willpower when they decide to go on a diet. They are not over-eating. The problem is quite the opposite - the common North American diet approach is to eat fewer calories than you need to maintain basic metabolic function and therefore put yourself into starvation metabolism. The result of this naturally is to initially stimulate ghrelin levels which then make us feel very hungry.
For more on our natural approach to weight control go to www.keepcanadaslim.com.
Since we are using our willpower to overcome this natural urge, we begin to create internal stress. This in turn generates cortisol, the stress hormone, which makes us want to eat more. We don’t, because we are on a diet, so next we don’t stimulate serotonin, which tells us when we have had enough. Low serotonin leads to depression and makes us feel that we are depriving ourselves when we choose not to eat. This negative association makes weight loss an unhappy prospect for most people.
If we maintain our caloric level above our basal metabolic rate level and below our maintenance level, as explained throughout the KCS - KAS materials we don't over-stimulate ghrelin and therefore don't have this issue to deal with.
I hope this explains to you how dieting and chronic under-eating causes hormones to be out of balance. When people continually live on a low-calorie diet as is the case today with many adults of all ages, especially postmenopausal women, they eventually disturb hormone levels and ghrelin and the other hormones become less effective. It could to be that over time by constant dieting ghrelin is not even created in sufficient quantities to stimulate appetite. Our biggest challenge as many of you know in the Keep Canada / Keep America Slim program is to actually get our clients to eat enough food every day. None of our clients are over eating and therefore none would require a drug to reduce ghrelin levels.
In actual fact the true breakthrough in this study is the discovery that possibly ghrelin levels could be used to stimulate appetite. The first target group for this would be anorexics and people recovering from surgery who have no appetite. The second target group would be people who have conditioned their metabolism to live on a low-calorie starvation diet and are now struggling to eat sufficient calories to release starvation metabolism and achieve success with long-term weight control, such as that presented in the KCS - KAS lifestyle.
And finally there is a way that you can utilize this new understanding in a positive way. One practical application of this discovery is in the explanation of why we tend to buy more food at the grocery store if we are hungry when we go shopping. The higher levels of ghrelin in our body make food more attractive and we therefore buy more than we intended, and perhaps more than we need.
So the successful application of this new discovery would be to have something to eat before you go grocery shopping. This will satisfy the ghrelin impulse and help you to have balanced hormones when you are grocery shopping, which will result in more rational purchases.
Contact Big Skinny at bigskinny@keepcanadaslim.com
www.keepamericaslim.com
You may have read the article or seen a report on television recently about a so-called breakthrough in which Canadian researchers at McGill University have identified the fact that a hormone called ghrelin seems to cause people to overeat. Let me try to answer questions you may have on this issue.
Ghrelin as we mention in the Keep Canada / Keep America Slim materials is only one of a number of hormones that impact our appetite, satiety, and food metabolism. It is no more or no less important than any of the others. These other hormones include insulin, serotonin, leptin, cortisol, dopamine and others. Learn more about our program at http://www.keepamericaslim.com/.
Each one has a role to play in telling us when to eat and when to stop eating and also in helping us utilize food. When your body and your metabolism is in balance these hormones are in balance and do their job successfully. Alternatively if these hormones are out of balance your eating and fat-storing habits will be negatively affected.
In the case of ghrelin this hormone is created in our stomach and tells us that it's time to eat. Without ghrelin we might go days without food. This would not be healthy.
The articles about ghrelin, in the typical unbalanced media perspective, suggest that in the future we might have a drug that could control our ghrelin levels so that we don't want to eat. The concept would be that this drug would help us control ourselves while surrounded with all the food choices we have in the modern world. The underlying analysis is that overweight people have no self-control and are constantly gorging themselves on whatever foods pass their line of vision, apparently because of ghrelin gone wild.
All of this is wrong on several counts. First off as we know the vast majority of North Americans have tremendous willpower when they decide to go on a diet. They are not over-eating. The problem is quite the opposite - the common North American diet approach is to eat fewer calories than you need to maintain basic metabolic function and therefore put yourself into starvation metabolism. The result of this naturally is to initially stimulate ghrelin levels which then make us feel very hungry.
For more on our natural approach to weight control go to www.keepcanadaslim.com.
Since we are using our willpower to overcome this natural urge, we begin to create internal stress. This in turn generates cortisol, the stress hormone, which makes us want to eat more. We don’t, because we are on a diet, so next we don’t stimulate serotonin, which tells us when we have had enough. Low serotonin leads to depression and makes us feel that we are depriving ourselves when we choose not to eat. This negative association makes weight loss an unhappy prospect for most people.
If we maintain our caloric level above our basal metabolic rate level and below our maintenance level, as explained throughout the KCS - KAS materials we don't over-stimulate ghrelin and therefore don't have this issue to deal with.
I hope this explains to you how dieting and chronic under-eating causes hormones to be out of balance. When people continually live on a low-calorie diet as is the case today with many adults of all ages, especially postmenopausal women, they eventually disturb hormone levels and ghrelin and the other hormones become less effective. It could to be that over time by constant dieting ghrelin is not even created in sufficient quantities to stimulate appetite. Our biggest challenge as many of you know in the Keep Canada / Keep America Slim program is to actually get our clients to eat enough food every day. None of our clients are over eating and therefore none would require a drug to reduce ghrelin levels.
In actual fact the true breakthrough in this study is the discovery that possibly ghrelin levels could be used to stimulate appetite. The first target group for this would be anorexics and people recovering from surgery who have no appetite. The second target group would be people who have conditioned their metabolism to live on a low-calorie starvation diet and are now struggling to eat sufficient calories to release starvation metabolism and achieve success with long-term weight control, such as that presented in the KCS - KAS lifestyle.
And finally there is a way that you can utilize this new understanding in a positive way. One practical application of this discovery is in the explanation of why we tend to buy more food at the grocery store if we are hungry when we go shopping. The higher levels of ghrelin in our body make food more attractive and we therefore buy more than we intended, and perhaps more than we need.
So the successful application of this new discovery would be to have something to eat before you go grocery shopping. This will satisfy the ghrelin impulse and help you to have balanced hormones when you are grocery shopping, which will result in more rational purchases.
Contact Big Skinny at bigskinny@keepcanadaslim.com
www.keepamericaslim.com
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Top 10 Worst Fast Foods
A&W tops list of Keep Canada Slim 2008 Worst Fast Foods
HAMILTON: A&W took two of the top three spots in Keep Canada Slim’s 2008 Worst Fast Foods in Canada competition, announced today.
A&W’s aptly named “Chubby Chicken Dinner,” won the Worst Dinner/Lunch Award, while their large Chocolate Milkshake won in the Worst Drink category. A&W narrowly missed a sweep when their Deluxe Bacon & Eggs finished third in the Worst Breakfast category behind Burger King’s Enormous Omelette Sandwich.
Note: The complete list in chart form would not "paste" into this format, so we have made it available on our website newsletter archives at http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=readArchives&newsletterId=12.
Burger King topped the list with 4 awards followed by A&W with 3, Wendy’s, Harvey’s and Subway with two each. McDonalds, KFC and Taco Bell rounded out the list with one award each. Subway and KFC also received special dishonourable mentions.
Keep Canada Slim (KCS) President Lee Fairbanks said the awards were created to focus attention on food choices. “We are asking these companies to remove these foods from their menu,” said KCS President Lee Fairbanks. “No Canadian should be encouraged to eat them. In the meantime we urge Canadians to boycott these items by refusing to purchase them.”
Worst Dinner/Lunch
The Chubby Chicken Dinner clocked in at 1230 calories with a whopping 68 grams of fat and 3180 mg of sodium. In second place in the Dinner/Lunch category, Wendy’s Triple Everything with Cheese offers 980 calories, 60 grams of fat and 2010 mg of sodium. Third place went to KFC’s Poutine with 970 calories, 54 grams of fat and 2610 mg of sodium.
“Considering that Canada’s Food Guide suggests an average woman consume no more than 2000 calories and 2400 mg of sodium, these choices virtually guarantee weight gain,” said Fairbanks. “Most people would add a side order and a drink to these meals, and if they are not careful, could consume their entire day’s calories in one sitting. The Chubby Chicken dinner wins our Heart Attack on a Plate award.”
KFC won dishonourable mention in this category for their listing of Original Recipe Chicken by the piece.
“Each piece has up to 300 calories, 19 grams of fat and 860 mg of sodium, so if you ate 3 or 4 pieces this product would be in the race for first place,” Fairbanks points out.
Subway also received a dishonourable mention for their Ranch Dressing, 320 calories, 35 grams of fat and 560 mg of sodium.
“This is really liquid fat and salt, and has more calories and 7 times as much fat as their 6-inch low-fat sandwiches,” says Fairbanks. “And again, most people aren’t even counting their dressing as a meal, so these rank as ‘hidden calories’.”
Worst Drink
First place in the Worst Drink category went to A&W’s large chocolate milkshake, registering 1720 calories, 47 grams of fat and an amazing 254 grams of sugar.
“This is really 4 or 5 meals in a glass,” offered Fairbanks, “plus about a week’s worth of sugar. Two hundred and fifty-four grams is about 60 teaspoons of sugar. It amazes me that any company could even create such a product as this. The shake also has 1130 mg of sodium. Most of us wouldn’t consider a milkshake as a major source of salt in our diet.”
Second place in the Worst Drink category went to Burger King’s large Fruitopia with 860 calories and 213 grams of sugar, with Harvey’s 14-ounce chocolate milkshake in third. The Harvey shake has 870 calories with 47 grams of fat and 92 grams of sugar. Fairbanks points out that many parents might think Fruitopia is a good choice for children.
“Considering that Fruitopia is fat-free, the calorie count is very high, and it’s mostly from sugar/glucose-fructose. This combination drives the sugar quickly into the bloodstream and is guaranteed to create a sugar high followed by a dramatic energy drop. I would call it Mood Swing in a Cup.”
Worst Breakfast
In the Breakfast category, Burger King’s Enormous Omelette Sandwich took home First Prize at 730 calories with 44 grams of fat and an even 2000 mg of sodium. The McDonalds Big Breakfast (640-38-1250) and A&W’s Bacon & Eggs Deluxe (650-37-1010) were second and third.
“Most people should aim for 3-400 calories for breakfast and focus on high fibre, low fat and low sodium foods. This sets them up for the day and allows room for higher-fat food choices later in the day when choices become more difficult,” suggests Fairbanks.
Rounding out the Top Ten list for Lunch/Dinner are: 4 - Wendy’s Baconator (840-51-1880); 5 – Burger King Poutine (750-42-2720); 6 – Burger King Original Double Whopper (850-51-990); 7 – A&W Grandpa Burger with Cheese (752-49-1200); 8 – Taco Bell Fiesta Taco Salad (850-45-1690); 9 – Subway 6-inch Double ColdCut Trio (660-39-2160); 10 – Subway 6-inch Double BMT (630-34-2640).
All contents were taken from company websites and were current as of April 7, 2008.
More info at
http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/
Lee Fairbanks
bigskinny@keepcanadaslim.com
HAMILTON: A&W took two of the top three spots in Keep Canada Slim’s 2008 Worst Fast Foods in Canada competition, announced today.
A&W’s aptly named “Chubby Chicken Dinner,” won the Worst Dinner/Lunch Award, while their large Chocolate Milkshake won in the Worst Drink category. A&W narrowly missed a sweep when their Deluxe Bacon & Eggs finished third in the Worst Breakfast category behind Burger King’s Enormous Omelette Sandwich.
Note: The complete list in chart form would not "paste" into this format, so we have made it available on our website newsletter archives at http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/index.cfm?page=readArchives&newsletterId=12.
Burger King topped the list with 4 awards followed by A&W with 3, Wendy’s, Harvey’s and Subway with two each. McDonalds, KFC and Taco Bell rounded out the list with one award each. Subway and KFC also received special dishonourable mentions.
Keep Canada Slim (KCS) President Lee Fairbanks said the awards were created to focus attention on food choices. “We are asking these companies to remove these foods from their menu,” said KCS President Lee Fairbanks. “No Canadian should be encouraged to eat them. In the meantime we urge Canadians to boycott these items by refusing to purchase them.”
Worst Dinner/Lunch
The Chubby Chicken Dinner clocked in at 1230 calories with a whopping 68 grams of fat and 3180 mg of sodium. In second place in the Dinner/Lunch category, Wendy’s Triple Everything with Cheese offers 980 calories, 60 grams of fat and 2010 mg of sodium. Third place went to KFC’s Poutine with 970 calories, 54 grams of fat and 2610 mg of sodium.
“Considering that Canada’s Food Guide suggests an average woman consume no more than 2000 calories and 2400 mg of sodium, these choices virtually guarantee weight gain,” said Fairbanks. “Most people would add a side order and a drink to these meals, and if they are not careful, could consume their entire day’s calories in one sitting. The Chubby Chicken dinner wins our Heart Attack on a Plate award.”
KFC won dishonourable mention in this category for their listing of Original Recipe Chicken by the piece.
“Each piece has up to 300 calories, 19 grams of fat and 860 mg of sodium, so if you ate 3 or 4 pieces this product would be in the race for first place,” Fairbanks points out.
Subway also received a dishonourable mention for their Ranch Dressing, 320 calories, 35 grams of fat and 560 mg of sodium.
“This is really liquid fat and salt, and has more calories and 7 times as much fat as their 6-inch low-fat sandwiches,” says Fairbanks. “And again, most people aren’t even counting their dressing as a meal, so these rank as ‘hidden calories’.”
Worst Drink
First place in the Worst Drink category went to A&W’s large chocolate milkshake, registering 1720 calories, 47 grams of fat and an amazing 254 grams of sugar.
“This is really 4 or 5 meals in a glass,” offered Fairbanks, “plus about a week’s worth of sugar. Two hundred and fifty-four grams is about 60 teaspoons of sugar. It amazes me that any company could even create such a product as this. The shake also has 1130 mg of sodium. Most of us wouldn’t consider a milkshake as a major source of salt in our diet.”
Second place in the Worst Drink category went to Burger King’s large Fruitopia with 860 calories and 213 grams of sugar, with Harvey’s 14-ounce chocolate milkshake in third. The Harvey shake has 870 calories with 47 grams of fat and 92 grams of sugar. Fairbanks points out that many parents might think Fruitopia is a good choice for children.
“Considering that Fruitopia is fat-free, the calorie count is very high, and it’s mostly from sugar/glucose-fructose. This combination drives the sugar quickly into the bloodstream and is guaranteed to create a sugar high followed by a dramatic energy drop. I would call it Mood Swing in a Cup.”
Worst Breakfast
In the Breakfast category, Burger King’s Enormous Omelette Sandwich took home First Prize at 730 calories with 44 grams of fat and an even 2000 mg of sodium. The McDonalds Big Breakfast (640-38-1250) and A&W’s Bacon & Eggs Deluxe (650-37-1010) were second and third.
“Most people should aim for 3-400 calories for breakfast and focus on high fibre, low fat and low sodium foods. This sets them up for the day and allows room for higher-fat food choices later in the day when choices become more difficult,” suggests Fairbanks.
Rounding out the Top Ten list for Lunch/Dinner are: 4 - Wendy’s Baconator (840-51-1880); 5 – Burger King Poutine (750-42-2720); 6 – Burger King Original Double Whopper (850-51-990); 7 – A&W Grandpa Burger with Cheese (752-49-1200); 8 – Taco Bell Fiesta Taco Salad (850-45-1690); 9 – Subway 6-inch Double ColdCut Trio (660-39-2160); 10 – Subway 6-inch Double BMT (630-34-2640).
All contents were taken from company websites and were current as of April 7, 2008.
More info at
http://www.keepcanadaslim.com/
Lee Fairbanks
bigskinny@keepcanadaslim.com
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