Higher protein intakes naturally lead to less eating later on
I usually eat breakfast, but sometimes I drink it. If I’m short on time and it’s too early to eat I might whizz up a ‘smoothie’ with a range of ingredients that cover a number of nutritional bases. Typical ingredients include berries, plain, raw egg, full-fat yoghurt, coconut milk and/or cream, water and a little [...]
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Cholesterol researchers make up the rules as they go along
There is a well-established paradigm in medicine that ‘raised’ levels of cholesterol cause heart disease and that reducing cholesterol levels has broad benefits for health. Yet, despite how firmly these concepts are entrenched in the psyche of doctors and their patients, these assertions fail to tell the whole story regarding cholesterol and its management. One, [...]
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Adequate sleep found to be important for healthy body composition
Many individuals contend that weight control is all about diet and exercise. Of these, the research suggests that dietary change is likely to bring the lion’s share of benefits. However, body weight and fatness are not determined only by these lifestyle factors. Hormonal issues can play a part too. For example, if the thyroid gland [...]
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Some reasons why exercise may not translate into weight loss
Earlier this month one of my posts focused on a study which tested the effect of exercise on weight loss in women. This year-long study found that, on average, the women needed to exercise for 77 hours to lose a kg of fat. Now, if I said I had pretty-much foolproof way of getting a [...]
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Why we can’t rely on epidemiological evidence
I came across this post recently, on the website of a Tom Naughton – a comedian and now nutritional commentator based in the US. Now I should imagine that comedians don’t necessarily make for the best nutritional commentators ordinarily. But Tom is an exception to this rule – he does a great job, in my [...]
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Cinnamon again found to benefit diabetics
Back in December I wrote this post which explored the apparent ability of cinnamon to reduce blood sugar levels, particularly in diabetics. One of the studies mentioned in this post showed that cinnamon added to normal diabetic care led to improved outcomes compared to standard diabetic care alone. While this result was certainly promising, the [...]
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Researchers give mammography another vote of no confidence
Mammography is a screening tool designed to diagnose breast cancer earlier than it other would be, which should lead to earlier, better and more effective treatment. Well, that’s the theory anyway. But as with the case with many things, theory does not always translate smoothly into practice. There has been for some years now growing [...]
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More evidence that a protein-rich diet helps satisfy the appetite
Conventional dictates that to lose weight we need to eat less and/or exercise more. Traditionally, this leads people to cutting back on what they eat and perhaps upping their exercise too. Studies show that exercise, however, is not particularly effective for the purposes of weight. See here for a recent blog post about this. And [...]
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Higher saturated fat intakes found to be associated with a reduced risk of dying from cardiovascular disease
The idea that eating more saturated fat will increases our risk of heart disease is claimed to be ‘well-established’ according to most nutritional commentators. The fact is, as I disclosed here, there really isn’t any good evidence to support this assertion. Three major reviews in recent times have failed to find evidence demonstrating that saturated [...]
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Rebranding something unhealthy does not make it healthy
Variously, I have written about the now quite voluminous and ever-growing body of research which demonstrates that fructose has considerable potential to harm health. See here, here, here and here for examples of research which implicates fructose as a potential causative factor in a wide range of health issues including weight gain and cancer. So [...]
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