Creating Your Own Personal Nutrition Plan
There are four basic assessments. The first is to do with what is called anthropometric measurements. In other words, body measurements. The first measurement is that of your height. The next measurement is that of your weight. In measuring your weight it’s really good to be consistent and to weigh yourself at the same time each day with the same state of dress or undress. Next, is to measure your waist circumference, if your waist circumference is greater than 35 inches for a woman or 40 inches for a man, it means that you are likely to develop pre-diabetes or metabolic syndrome. The next measurement is that of your body composition, which is the measurement of lean vs. fat. There are two ways to do this measurement, one is in a Bod-Pod and the other is underwater. Body fat percentage should be less than 30% for woman or less than 20% for men. So how do you calculate your body mass index? You can look on-line or…. Take your weight in pounds and multiply that weight by 703, then divide that by your height in inches squared. A body mass index of greater than 25 is considered overweight, 30 or greater is obese and less than 19.8 is considered underweight. The reason to measure your body composition is because for those that have a lot of muscle, your body mass index will be skewed. To measure your ideal body weight use the HAMWI equation. For women, it is 100 pounds for the first 5 ft and then add 5 pounds for each inch over 5 ft. For men, it is 106 pounds for the first 5 ft and 6 pounds for each inch over 5 ft. To calculate calorie needs, first calculate your HAMWI equation and then multiply it by ten. This gives you your basic metabolic rate. You can add 30% more calories if you are sedentary, 50% more calories if you are moderately active, and 100% if you are active. So, for example if I, as a woman am 5ft,4” and I weigh 180 pounds, my ideal body weight is 120 pounds. This would mean according to the body mass index, that I would need to lose 60 pounds. If I am sedentary, in order to maintain my ideal body weight I would need to consume about 1500 calories per day. If I didn’t want to have such a low calorie count per day I would have to increase from sedentary to moderately active by walking at least 3 miles a day so that I could burn an additional 300 calories. Compare this example to a moderately active man who is 5ft,8” and weighs 200 pounds with a 44 inch waist, he would be considered pre-diabetic. Being moderately active, his daily calorie intake would need to be 2300 calories per day to maintain his current weight. The second assessment is biochemical, this is to do with having your blood work done to determine cholesterol and any vitamin, iron, or folic acid deficiencies. Next, is a clinical assessment which includes any chronic illnesses that might require dietary modifications, which also includes any medications that you may be on. The next assessment is dietary, which is comprised of your ideal caloric intake, your actual caloric intake, number of carbohydrates, proteins and fats, beverage intake as well as exercise. It is important to remember that you do have to be very realistic and losing weight, however slowly, is progress! Patience is a virtue.
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Emerald HillOn the quest to lose 50 pounds in a year. Can she do it? Only time will tell....with the help of this blog. Archives
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