Can people be taught to think their way to smaller waists?

Scientists in Roanoke and Blacksburg plan to team up with Carilion Clinic doctors to explore the answer.

The work will be done at a new lifestyle center that the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute is building in Roanoke. Researchers will look at the connection between the mind and the body, and at whether people who are coached to think differently will eat better, exercise more and change the way their bodies burn calories.

Warren Bickel, who studies how people make decisions, and Matthew Hulver, who looks at how their bodies use energy, will head the Center for Transformative Research on Health Behaviors in Roanoke.

One of the impetuses for this is we are getting better at treating diseases that have a strong biological basis, Bickel said. Whats going to be a bigger piece of health care, and the costs, are the things we do to ourselves. We eat too much. We dont exercise enough. We consume too many substances. We dont follow physicians advice. So health behavior, in a very real sense, has a great potential to be the future of medicine.

The center will be in Carilions Riverside 1 building, a stones throw from the VTC Research Institute and School of Medicine, and is the first spinoff to be created within the Roanoke Innovation District.

Bickel and Hulver have been meeting with other Tech researchers and with Carilion physicians to pursue collaborations that will help them better understand the body-mind connections that affect health.

Bickels research at the VTC Research Center looks at which regions of the brain are involved in decision-making. People who use regions that are more prone to impulsive behavior tend to value the future less and think more short-term. They are also more likely to overeat, drink too much and become addicted to substances. Its a process he terms discounting the future.

Hulvers research at the Virginia Tech College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Department of Human Nutrition, Foods and Exercise looks at the physiology of metabolism and how it is affected by high-calorie, high-fat, Westernized diets that contribute to obesity and diabetes.

One of the first conversations Warren and I had was that certain parts of the brain are more impulsive and certain parts are more logical. It would be interesting to see how those affect obesity, Hulver said. If this part of your brain is lighting up, and youre impulsive, there have got to be some signals going out to the body.

They have started screening 200 people using Bickels method of assessing the way they value the future, and will then use Hulvers methods to measure whole-body metabolism and how people with extreme ways of thinking respond to a meal with the aim of exploring a link between brain decisions and metabolism.

Bickel and Hulver said the center goes beyond their collaborations and will function as a clearinghouse for others studying health behaviors.

Bickel said he and Michael Friedlander, Techs vice president for health sciences and technology and executive director of the research institute, were talking about moving into health behaviors at the same time Techs translational obesity center was looking for a new direction.

We said, what if we combined our interests, because they clearly overlap they are different parts of the same beast, sort of like the elephant, ones grabbing one part, the other is grabbing another part and actually put it together? Wed have more than the sum of the parts and could actually generate more interest and excitement and involvement, Bickel said.

The center plans to link researchers in Blacksburg and Roanoke with Carilion clinicians to work on projects that can affect the health of people living in the area.

Knowing how to change health behaviors, that lead to major expenses and utilize a lot of resources, and helping people change is where medicine is going to be heading in the next 20 to 30 years, Bickel said.

The center is expected to open in June.

Excerpt from:
New VTCRI center to explore if people can think their way to smaller waists - Roanoke Times

May 17, 2017 by Adityarup

Certain kinds of foods prescribed to manage the rare metabolic disorder phenylketonuria (PKU) could contribute to skeletal fragility seen in many PKU patients, according to a new study by University of WisconsinMadison researchers.

Led by Waisman Center and College of Agricultural and Life Sciences investigator Denise Ney and her graduate student Bridget Stroup, the study represents the first human clinical trial to compare how different PKU-specific diets affect the bone health of people living with the disease. Skeletal fragility affects 40-to-50 percent of adults with PKU and 33 percent of children with the disease.

Individuals with PKU must adhere to a lifelong diet of medical foods that contain protein but are low in the amino acid phenylalanine. Their bodies are unable to metabolize phenylalanine, so it accumulates at high levels in their blood, leading to intellectual disabilities, seizures and other serious health problems.

However, almost all naturally occurring proteins contain phenylalanine, so in order to get enough protein, people with PKU have traditionally eaten medical foods containing synthetic protein substitutes made from amino acids. Still, they often struggle to maintain adequate bone health.

Just over a decade ago, Ney helped develop foods for PKU patients made from a protein called glycomacropeptide (GMP), a natural byproduct found in the whey extracted during cheese production. In one study, Ney showed that mice fed GMP-based diets had larger and stronger bones than mice on amino acid-based diets.

"It was a vital clue that there could be a link between amino acid medical foods and the skeletal fragility seen in many PKU patients," says Ney.

For the current study, published in the Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism, Ney and her research team assigned eight individuals with PKU to a diet of amino acid-based medical foods. Then, these same patients switched to a GMP-based diet.

The researchers found that, compared to when on the GMP diet, PKU patients had higher amounts of calcium and magnesium in their urine while on the amino acid-based diet, which indicated that their bones were leaching elements critical for bone health.

"The amino acid medical foods have high acid loads, which can change the overall acid-base balance within the body," says Stroup. Bones are able to buffer high acid loads in the body, but over time this leads to a breakdown and release of minerals. GMP medical foods, on the other hand, do not have high acid loads.

Although the researchers did not directly measure bone breakdown and density in this study, other studies have found that reducing the acid content of diets leads to lower urine-calcium excretion and increased bone density. The findings, Ney says, could help patients with other kinds of metabolic disorders, like maple syrup urine disease. And though the sample size of the study was relatively small, it is typical of rare diseases. Ney hopes to secure additional funding for further study.

Her work carries on a legacy of PKU research at the Waisman Center and at UWMadison. Harry Waisman, after whom the center is named, championed mandatory newborn screening for PKU and dedicated his life to developing treatments for the disorder. Waisman was among the first to show that PKU can be managed by strictly adhering to a low-phenylalanine diet.

Today, Ney is working on a larger clinical trial to study the metabolism of calcium and other minerals in PKU patients consuming amino acid or GMP medical foods. "We will be looking at bone health, but also other physiological aspects, such as the gut microbiota," says Ney.

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Original post:
New clues to healthy bones for those with PKU - Medical Xpress

There are plenty of commercial diets that advocate cutting carbohydrates for instant weight loss and as a result, many Americans have become accustomed to counting the carbohydrate grams in the foods they eat and buy. The problem is our bodies need carbohydrate to function properly. So instead of avoiding this essential nutrient all together, make your carbohydrate work for you buy choosing foods that provide the nutrition needed for a healthy life.

In our bodies, carbohydrates are converted to glucose, our bodys main source of fuel. The brain, nervous system and blood cells all rely heavily on glucose to function properly. And while cutting out or cutting back on some carbohydrate heavy foods can be beneficial to your health (think pizza and donuts), there are many nutrient-dense carbs that have a place in your daily meal plan.

Choosing between simple and complex carbohydrates is the first step. Simple carbohydrates are exactly that: foods full of simple sugars that arent doing much for your body besides providing empty calories and probably tasting delicious. These foods, things like white bread, cookies and cakes, can have an occasional place in our diets, but in excess can contribute to weight gain, heart disease and diabetes.

Instead choose complex carbohydrates, which are foods that are minimally processed and deliver nutritional benefits like vitamins, minerals and fiber. Some great examples include whole grains, beans, fruits and vegetables. And yes, fruits and vegetables are carbohydrates.

Even though our bodies cant actually digest it, fiber is another important reason we need carbohydrates in our diet. Fiber helps regulate the bodys use of sugars, and appears to reduce the risk of developing many health conditions like digestive irregularities, heart disease and diabetes. A high-fiber diet is typically lower in calories and contributes bulk to your meals, making you feel full faster and longer. The daily recommendation is 25 grams for women and 38 grams for men. A diet high in plant-based foods can help you meet your daily fiber needs, so add extra vegetables to soups and casseroles, oats to meatloaf and breads, and top your yogurt or salad with fresh fruit.

The next time you are tempted to count carbohydrates, instead make your carbohydrates count by remembering the source is more important than the amount.

Taryn Palmer is a registered dietitian for the Magic Valley YMCA.

Read more here:
Palmer: Make your carbohydrates count - Twin Falls Times-News

On TV, you can drop 30 pounds in a few weeks. In real life and clinical trials, 5-10 pounds over the course of a year is more realistic and actually quite impressive, Christopher Labos writes. Trent Penny / THE CANADIAN PRESS

The other day, over dinner, I got into a debate with some friends about intermittent fasting. Its a new diet strategy where you eat restrictively on some days but then eat freely, almost indulgently, on others. Although many forms of intermittent fasting exist, the most common form Ive seen is whats called alternate day fasting.

With alternate day fasting, you can eat very little on one day (usually one 500 calorie meal at lunch time, or about one-quarterof what a regular diet includes) and then essentially eat to your hearts content on the next day before repeating the two-day cycle.

The idea has an obvious appeal. Dieting is hard because eventually, people find the restrictive nature of most diets impossible to stick with and revert to their old ways. But alternate day fasting seems easier because most people can summon enough will power for one day if they know they can be libertines tomorrow.

The obvious question becomes, does intermittent fasting work? Will it help you lose weight? And perhaps most important, does it outperform a standard diet where you just eat a little bit less every day?

That question was answered recently in a study published in JAMA Internal Medicine. Researchers took 100 obese adults and divided them into threegroups. The first group was told to continue their regular habits. The second intermittent fasting group ate a single 500-calorie meal on fasting days while on feasting days they could eat up to 25per cent more than they usually did. The third group was told to follow a conventional diet where they simply ate less every day.

The results were a surprise to the researchers. There was no difference between intermittent fasting and conventional diets. Both groups did equally well. Or if you are a nihilist, both groups did equally badly. At sixmonths, both groups had lost just under sevenpounds. By one year, the number had slipped back to about sixpounds.

These numbers probably dont seem that impressive. On TV, you can drop 30 pounds in a few weeks. In real life and clinical trials, 5-10 pounds over the course of a year is more realistic and actually quite impressive.

But intermittent fasting proved to be a disappointment in this trial. It did not outperform its conventional counterpart. In terms of weight loss, visceral fat, blood pressure, blood sugar, insulin levels and inflammatory markers, there was no difference between intermittent fast and simply eating a little less on a daily basis. In fact the intermittent fasting group had slightly higher cholesterol levels at oneyear, although the difference was minimal.

Here, intermittent fasting underperformed because rather than being easier to stick with, it ended up being harder. More people abandoned the intermittent fast (38per cent vs. 29per cent) and ended up switching to conventional diets.

In the end, intermittent fasting is not better than a standard diet. It wont help you lose more weight and it wont make you any healthier. Though to be fair, its not much worse, either. And contrary to the hype, it actually seems to be harder to stick with long term, not easier.

Im sure some people will swear by intermittent fasting and say that it works for them. The point here though is not that one diet is better than other. Its that dietswork only if they get you to eat less. Eating less is really the only way you can lose weight (although regular exercise certainly wont hurt). How you do it isnt really as important as whether you do it. Fad diets fail because they are unsustainable and people abandon them. So when Im asked whats the best type of diet, the answer is clear. The best diet is the one you can stick with.

Christopher Labos is a Montreal doctor who writes about medicine and health issues.

Christopher.labos@mail.mcgill.ca

twitter.com/drlabos

View original post here:
Opinion: Alternate-day fasting vs. a classic weight loss diet - Montreal Gazette

When 16-year-old Davis Allen Cripe collapsed in a Spring Hill High School classroom last month, people were confused and concerned. The South Carolina teen was rushed to a hospital at the time, but he sadly passed away within two hours of collapsing.

At a Monday news conference, the local coroner, Gary Watts, revealed that Cripe had experienced a " caffeine -induced cardiac event" after drinking a large Diet Mountain Dew (about 135 mg of caffeine), a McDonald's cafe latte (about 142 mg), and an undisclosed energy drink (a typical energy drink contains about 142 mg) over a two-hour periodapproximately 419 total mg of caffeine in just 120 minutes.

Ingesting so much caffeine in such a short amount of time led to what the coroner called a "probable arrhythmia "or an abnormal beating of the heart. "Davis, like so many other kids and so many other people out there today, was doing something [he] thought was totally harmless, and that was ingesting lots of caffeine," Watts said . "We lost Davis from a totally legal substance."

The teen's father, Sean Cripe, followed up Watts's statements at the news conference by asking parents to educate their children about the potential consequences of consuming too much caffeine. He explained that his son was healthy; the teen advocated against the use of drugs and alcohol, and he didn't have a history of any medical problems. "It wasnt a car crash that took his life," Cripe said. "It was an energy drink . Parents, please talk to your kids about these energy drinks. And, teenagers and students, please stop buying them."

Since caffeine is a stimulant, it can make the heart beat faster or irregularly. Caffeine also has a diuretic effectmeaning it makes people urinate more frequently. This can cause their potassium levels to drop (they're peeing out the nutrients), which makes it even harder to regulate the heartbeat. Combined, these effects can lead to seriousand potentially fatal cardiac events, Marcel Casavant , M.D., medical director of the Central Ohio Poison Control Center at Nationwide Children's Hospital, tells SELF.

These dangerous events are characterized by symptoms like an abnormally high heart rate, anxiety, tremors, nausea, and/or vomiting, Casavant says. And if you experience any of them after ingesting a substance (whether it's caffeine or something else), you should stop consuming the substance as soon as this happens.

So let's say you understand the potential dangers of caffeine but still want to enjoy a morning cup of coffee or two. Where's the line between caffeinating yourself safely and risking something more serious? The truth is, it depends.

Caffeinelike alcoholimpacts different people differently. Two people could ingest the same amount of caffeine and experience different outcomes, based on weight, size, age, gender, maximum heart rate, and potassium levels. Because of all these variables, it's hard to issue a blanket statement about how much caffeine a person can safely drink.

That's why it's so important to limit your caffeine intake, if possible, Casavant says. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommends that adults consume no more than 400 milligrams of caffeine (that's about four or five cups of coffee) a day. And the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that children and adolescents consume no caffeine or stimulants whatsoever.

There are many benefits to drinking coffee (like feeling more alert in the morning, for one thing), but you should still be aware of your total caffeine intake. And remember, caffeine can be hiding in many different foods and drinksnot just coffee and tea. Manufacturers put it in things like energy bars and candy. And it can be hard to estimate how much caffeine is in your cup in the first place, because it can vary so widely from place to place.

So instead of focusing on how much caffeine we can get away with consuming, Casavant thinks we should be asking ourselves why we need to consume the caffeine in the first place. "Why are we caffeinating our kidsand even ourselves?" he says. "We should be asking: Am I getting enough sleep? Is my child's sleep hygiene good, or is it interrupted by devices? Are my kids waking up too early for school? Am I staying up too late for work, play, or some social thing?"

That doesn't mean you have to quit your daily cup of coffeeor feel afraid of it. But it is worth understanding that caffeine, like many substances, can be dangerous in excess.

Our thoughts are with the Cripe family during this time of loss.

If you think you're experiencing symptoms of a caffeine overdose (or have ingested any poison), you should call the poison-control hotline (1-800-222-1222) to get a personalized assessment.

Related:

You might also like: I Have a Pre-Existing Condition: Real People Share Their Health Conditions

Continued here:
Drinking Too Much Caffeine Can Be DeadlyHere's What You Need to Know - SELF

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