Obesity : Importance And Severity

Obesity is an important risk factor for many chronic diseases, including cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes (World Health Organization, 2003). For these two pathologies, the health risk increases when fat accumulates in the abdominal region, which occurs more often in men than in women who typically tend to store fat in the hips, thighs and buttocks (Pouliot et al., 1994). Thus, the higher prevalence of overweight among men is worrying from a social and health standpoint, since they generally accumulate their excess fat in the abdomen and are therefore more likely to develop such health problems.

The burden of chronic diseases, both from a health and an economic point of view, continues to increase throughout the world. Thus, the WHO estimated that 35 of the 58 million deaths worldwide in 2005 were attributable to chronic diseases, i.e. double the deaths from infectious diseases, maternal and perinatal conditions and nutritional deficiencies combined (World Health Organization , 2006). In 2004, in Canada, it was estimated that 45% of cases of hypertension, 39% of type II diabetes, 35% of gallbladder disease and 22% of endometrial cancers were attributable to obesity (Luo et al., 2007). In 2001, the direct and indirect health costs caused by obesity in Canada were estimated at $4.3 billion, or1.6 billion for direct costs and 2.7 billion for indirect costs, representing 2.2% of total health care costs. Are you looking Best Dietician in Delhi? Shivani Sikri is the top Online Dietician.

Concern About Weight : Another Facet Of Problem

Wanting to look like the canons of beauty is a very present concern in our culture oriented towards thinness, beauty and youth. Thus, the majority of women wish to be slim. This state of affairs is so prevalent that some consider it a social norm. So it’s not just people who are overweight who are trying to lose weight, but also people who are of adequate weight. It is important to take this aspect into account when analyzing the benefits and risks associated with the use of WLPSMs.

Obesity and overweight are scientifically well-defined entities. Although no definition of excessive preoccupation with weight currently enjoys consensus within the scientific community, various studies and surveys have attempted to document the phenomenon. To do this, a number of indicators were used, such as satisfaction with body image or weight and desire for less weight in people who were not overweight.

The motives for wanting to lose weight are also another way of taking into account the excessive preoccupation with weight. In the 1998 Social and Health Survey (Ledoux and Rivard, 2000), the two most frequently mentioned reasons for wanting to lose weight were “to be healthier” or “to improve appearance”. However, appearance was the reason most often reported by women, regardless of the weight category to which they belonged (82% to 91% for appearance and 44% to 82% for health), whereas the two reasons were mentioned in comparable proportions among men (59% to 80% for appearance and 64% to 85% for health). In the recent Ipsos-Reid survey (Ipsos-Reid, 2008) 83% of Quebec women reported self-esteem as the main motivation for losing weight, and 65% said that improving their health was an important motivator.

Concern About Weight : Another Facet Of Problem

Although most people immediately recognize the difficulty of changing their habits in a lasting way, on the other hand, the treatment of obesity is generally trivialized.

In popular belief, it all boils down to exercising your will: eating less and/or exercising more (However, little-known physiological mechanisms, triggered by weight control practices, partly thwart the efforts of dieters and generate erroneous and pejorative beliefs with regard to people afflicted with excess weight.

Intrinsically, weight loss is only obtained by the creation in the body of an energy deficit (intake < expenditure). Energy intake comes from food consumed, while energy expenditure comes from three sources: physical activity, food thermogenesis (energy used to digest and transform food) and basal metabolism (energy used by the body to maintain life and which represents 60-70% of total energy expenditure (Ravussin, 2002) Thus, there are three ways to lose weight: 1) reduce the amount of food consumed, 2) increase the expenditure in energy and 3) modify these two parameters simultaneously, eat less and move more.

In addition, the caloric restriction necessary to generate an energy deficit sufficient to cause weight loss can be perceived by the body as a threat to its balance. In fact, the body is better at defending itself against starvation than plenty, and the greater the energy restriction, the greater the body’s defense response (Hill, 2002). During caloric restriction, the body first draws the necessary energy from the glycogen stored in the liver. It will then look for it in the muscles, organs and fat mass.

Use of muscles and organs as a source of energy

When the primary source of energy ie liver glycogen is depleted, the body uses muscle glycogen stores. If necessary, during a greater and longer energy deficit, it will mobilize the proteins of the muscles.

Muscles, made up of protein and water, release this water when the protein part of the muscle is converted into energy. Some of the weight lost in the short term is therefore attributable to dehydration, but the water will generally be regained so that the body regains its normal water balance.

Muscle tissue strongly contributes to basal metabolism (Ravussin, 2002). A diet of less than 1000 calories can lead to a loss of 20% of muscle mass in a few weeks (Pavlou et al., 1985) and a loss of as little as half a kilogram of muscle slows the basic metabolism (Cunningham, 1982). Shivani is Best Dietician in Gurgaon. As a result, the loss of muscle mass, by reducing the amount of energy used by the

body at rest, increases the susceptibility of easily regaining weight after weight loss (Leibel, Rosenbaum and Hirsch, 1995), and thus contributes to the high rate of weight regain often observed in the months following the cessation of a such an approach

A diet that includes enough calories but is very low in carbohydrates is likely to cause more water and muscle loss than other types of diets. The explanation is as follows: certain tissues such as the brain only use glucose as fuel; when it becomes rare in the blood and its reserves are exhausted, the vital organs and muscles are put to use as a priority to quickly supply the glucose necessary for the proper functioning of the brain. Fat stores, for their part, have a limited capacity to produce glucose quickly and in large quantities.