Food Patterns for a Healthy Life

The new wave of thinking and believing that prevention is better than the cure is sweeping the world and is being perfected by noted medical experts. Healthy life is the best prevention, and this can be achieved by incorporating healthy food patterns in the lifestyle.

Sugar-Free Beverages

Quenching your thirst is serious business, especially when you do not know that what you put in your body may be fattening or unhealthy. Think “diet” if you want a soda. Most cola drinkers often look for the cola taste in their drinks. However, this is not particularly in line with a proper healthy life. A compromise, therefore, is a cola drink that will not add worry lines to your forehead from feeling guilty over the extra calories and chemical substances you have gulped down. So feel good and taste your cola drink minus the guilt.

Fruit and Vegetable Juices

The craze worldwide is to go natural. This explains the sudden proliferation of juice stands in malls and gyms. Natural juices are always best for the body and a healthy life. They help cleanse the system, are full of vitamins, and give you extra energy you need. While fruit juice may be more popular than vegetable juice, both types of beverages provide almost the same benefits to the body. Fruits have natural sugars and, therefore, provide a more palatable taste. Fruit juices are best taken the natural way. Avoid consuming over processed juices.

Avoid Processed Foods

Anything processes, whether canned, bottled or packaged may contain chemicals that adversely affect your health. However with the majority of processed foods in the supermarket, it is almost impossible to avoid processed foods. An essential tip for your healthy life is to read food labels before buying them. Preservatives or food additives like MSG (monosodium glutamate hydrolyzed vegetable protein sucrose) are very bad for you. Watch out for BVO (brominated vegetable oil), BHA (butylated hydroxyanisole) and BHT (butylated hydroxytoluene). These additives that are common in canned foods can cause a build-up in your body and eventually change the metamorphosis of cells.

Drink Lots of Water

Parched throats, dry lips and tongue are symptoms of thirst. Do not rely on signals of thirst alone, to decide on when to drink. Healthy life means drinking enough water to replace lost fluids in your system. A person with a good water habit is quite healthy. If you do not drink sufficient amount of water, your body cells will not function properly.

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Food Habits that will Change your Body Shape

A person’s body shape depends on his food habits. Therefore, a person who is unsatisfied with his body shape has no one to blame but himself. However, what caused the problem is also the solution in this case. Changing food habits to healthy and slimming ones can rapidly change a person’s body shape as long as it is done with conviction. Here are some food habits that you have to learn by heart, to make your body shape into a more pleasing one.

Trim the Fat off your Diet

Eat more fiber such as fruits, vegetables, and grain. Substitute red meat in your diet with fish or poultry. Chicken or turkey meat is better than red meat for it contains half the fat content. If you cannot avoid eating red meat, go lean. Trim the visible fat before cooking. Grill, roast or boil it to get rid of the invisible fat.  Top food habits include cooking with unsaturated vegetable oils like olive oil and Saffola instead of butter, lard or shortening. 

Go Non-Fat

Replace high-fat snacks like potato chips, candy bars, etc. with unbuttered popcorn, vegetables, and fruits. Go non-fat cow’s milk or soy milk instead of fresh cow’s milk. Sour cream based dressings can be replaced with low fat yogurt or cottage cheese. Skim the fat off soups by chilling them so that you can scrape off the top layer of fat. Going non-fat should be at the top of your food habits list.

 

Eating Habits

Food habits aren’t always literally about foods. It is also about eating. Remember to eat only when hungry. Never overeat. A common mistake made by people is relating food to negative emotions. The metabolism is much slower when there is stress on the body so remember never to eat when tired, tense or upset just for the sake of it. Eat five small meals a day rather than three big ones. Cut down on alcohol, coffee, tea and sodas. These beverages aren’t only bad for your health, they also have high calories. Do not eat late at night.

Know your Food Pyramid

There are carbohydrates that are good for you like asparagus, beans, broccoli, blueberries, cabbage, cantaloupe, citrus fruits etc. and there are bad carbohydrates such as bananas, breads, carrots, processed cereals, corn, pancakes, and potatoes. Knowing the food types and what they possess is part of good food habits. The trend nowadays is not limiting what you eat, rather knowing what you’re eating.

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Everything You Need to Know About Health Test

What is a health test?

A periodic health test is an overall assessment of a person’s health status. During this test, the doctor will have an inspection of the main body parts, palpation or feeling certain areas of the body and talk about your health issues or medical history. A health test will involve discussing medical conditions, medications, symptoms or problems, allergies and other health concerns you might have.

How often should a health test be conducted?

The regularity of a health test is set according to the gender, age and health issues that a patient has. Most of the time, people would have their period examination annually. However, a more frequent examination will be advised by your doctor in cases of medical anomalies or conditions.

Why should you get a health test?

The main intention of a health test is to know the health condition of a person. Overtime, the body goes through changes because of many factors such as environmental, diet, and lifestyle patterns. Paying a visit to your doctor regularly for an overall assessment would help detect life threatening diseases early, or do necessary changes to your lifestyle. In addition, an examination would help you realize potential hazards that you might be in and having this knowledge would help you in avoiding the worse situation. Other than that a health test will ease your worries about your health concerns which will greatly reduce your stress level. It is highly essential in keeping and maintaining a healthy body.

How safe is a health test?

Usually a health test is nonabrasive. Usually, it will not require any major surgeries or medications during the test itself. It is quite safe, and there are no risk factors that a patient needs to worry about. It is highly advised that a patient should open all medical history, medication intake, or health issues to the doctor administering the tests. This will help greatly in reducing any dangers that one might face.

What are the procedures done during a health test?

As mentioned previously, the doctor will not perform any major surgery rather it is mostly assessment by feeling, observing and discussing. In a health test, it will start by taking the patient’s height, weight and vital statistics such as heart rate, breathing rate and blood pressure. Then the doctor would check the eyes, ears, nose etc. by using a flashlight. Afterwards, the doctor would proceed in checking any irregularities with your major organs. Then the test is finished with a discussion about your health. 

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Top 10 Health Tips for Elders

Being in your golden years is no excuse for living a sedentary life. In contrast, this is the stage where you must become more wary of your health. Some diseases are inevitable because they come with aging. The build-up of toxins, chemicals and fats during your younger years can take a toll on vital organs. The only way to prevent more damage from happening is to keep these health tips in mind.

01. Aerobic Exercises

Important health tips include aerobic exercises. What activities qualify as aerobic exercise? For most people, any exercise consisting of rhythmic, continuous movement that utilizes the large muscle groups of the body is fair game. Walking, biking, jogging, swimming, skiing, dancing, jumping rope, and even stair climbing are all aerobic exercises.

02. Build Muscle

A popular form of aerobics for the elderly is floor aerobics. This is an aerobics routine performed on a floor without the use of paraphernalia during the exercise except some free weights or big rubber bands for some routines.

03. Increase your Bone Density

Osteoporosis, a disease that affects bone density attribute to calcium loss, is common among the elderly. Health tips from experts often involve running. Long distance running increases bone density in the legs considerably. You can also supplement your calcium needs by taking non-fat milk fortified with calcium or calcium supplements.

04. Burn Fat

Ballroom dancing is beneficial as a fat burning and cardiovascular workout if done continuously for 25 to 30 minutes non-stop. It is a great stress buster. Taebo is also a good fat-burning regimen for seniors because it is a fun sport. Like ballroom dancing, it reduces fat and strengthens the cardiovascular muscles. It is a workout that uses a combination of taekwondo and boxing.

05. Stretch your Muscles

Strengthening exercises of the skeletal muscles will prevent low back pain and improve posture. A good stretch regimen is yoga.

06. Breathe Well

This is the most important of all health tips. Breathing supports every body function. Every breath you take stimulates oxygen consumption and utilization. It is necessary to feed your body with oxygen. Without oxygen, a molecule call ATP cannot release its vital energy. Without vital energy, you will not function.

07. Avoid Bad Vices

Cigarette smoking destroys the body supply of vitamin C. Almost all health tips discourage cigarette smoking. This is one of the reasons why smokers develop deeper facial lines than non-smokers. If you are a passive smoker, make sure that you get your share of vitamin C.

08. Eat Berries

Eating more berries can boost your immune system and fight cancer. Ellagic Acid found in red raspberries, strawberries, and cranberries can clear the body of cancer causing chemicals and is a powerful anti-oxidant.

09. Get Regular Checkups

Health tips are quite effective if you know what your goal is. A regular check-up would inform you about the right diet, exercise regimen and more. Be sure to visit your doctor regularly

10. Natural Anti-oxidants

Fruits, vegetables and whole grains may be able to prevent or halt many illnesses associated with aging.

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How to Improve My Health: A Quick Guide to Good Health and a Sense of Well-Being

Whether it is because of a sudden ailment, a near-death experience or simply a general interest in healthy living and looking fit, everyone asks themselves this question sometime in their lives; “how can I know how to improve my health?” People look for special diet guides, exercise techniques and lifestyle tips that can lengthen the longevity of their lives, improve their immunity to diseases, or even to get that bikini body that they’ve always wanted.

If you are one of the many people who are in need of health improvement techniques and ideas straight from the experts, then this blog is for you. It can give you the know-how you need in order to get the health results that you have been looking for. Just like the title of this blog says, this article will provide a quick rundown on some easy tips that are guaranteed to put you on your way to a clean bill of health.

How to Improve My Health: Tips and Ideas

Before naming the different diets and exercises that one can take in order to promote healthy living, one must first start off with simple lifestyle changes that require no heavy lifting and are generally easy to do. You will not have to pay to get them, and they can make every day of your life a little more enjoyable than the last.

The first and essential step is to get an ample amount of sleep every day. In fact, lack of sleep can cause a plethora of health ailments and disorders. If you are in search for answers on how to improve my health, then you may be aware of the fact that not getting enough sleep can leave you without energy and stamina for the day ahead. Any work, recreation or exercises that you endeavor upon could be sabotaged by not getting the recommended 8 hours of sleep a night. In contrast, sleeping well can have wonderful implications on healthy weight loss, immunity to diseases and general happiness as a whole.

Opening yourself to new relationships and strengthening old relationships is also a cornerstone of health. Studies have shown that having good relationships with your family, co-workers, and community can have significant benefits to your health. Man is a social animal, and becoming a social person is incredibly healthy and natural. Sometimes, it’s not just about how to improve my health, but rather how to improve our health. Good company can turn you and your colleagues into healthier people in mind, body and soul.

Also keep a hopeful and optimistic outlook on life. Pessimists have been shown to be less happy and more prone to illness than those who look for the silver lining in even the greyest horizon. People with a positive perspective on life are at less risk for contracting heart disease and other stress-related ailments. Being optimistic is no assurance that things are going to go the way you want all the time. What it does assure is that you are less likely to stress about the bad things in life, and more likely to enjoy the good things in life.

Sometimes, it is just the little changes that make all the difference. A little bit more sleep, a little more time spent in good company and a lighter outlook on life can mean a much healthier, happier you. If you are still asking how to improve my health, then check out the rest of the articles on this blog. You’re sure to find something that will make a world of difference in you.

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