Advancing Your Health

It’s well known that we eat more calories when we dine out at restaurants than we would eating at home.  But, you don’t have to completely avoid restaurants when trying to manage your weight.  Here are some smart strategies to help control your calories.

1. Don't be afraid to ask for what you want. Have your server put high-fat condiments like salad dressing and mayonnaise on the side so you can control how much gets put on your meal.  Ask to substitute high-calorie side items like French fries for salad or steamed vegetables.
2. Take half your meal home. Ask for a to-go box as soon as your meal comes to the table.  Put half of it away before you are finished eating.  Now you have [...]
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As Super Bowl XLVI approaches, whether you’re pulling for the Giants, or call yourself a “Pats” fan, there is one thing most of us will share in common this Sunday-- the traditional Super Bowl party grub. While the game is a great time to spend time with loved ones and share in fun competitive camaraderie, the chances of overindulging from a nutritional standpoint are fairly good. Chips and dip, loaded baked potatoes, burgers and fries, you name it and it will probably be somewhere in the room on Sunday. To help you steer your team of party goers in a healthy direction, below you’ll find two fantastic Super Bowl party recipes to incorporate into your festivities this weekend:

Healthier Buffalo Chicken Strips

This recipe packs in all that Buffalo wing [...]

More and more people in Georgia are considering weight loss surgery as an option for returning to a healthy body weight. Because those who are overweight are at a higher risk for the development of conditions such as diabetes and heart disease, for many people, weight loss surgery means both regaining activity and mobility via a healthier body weight and the possibility of a longer, healthier life in general. Because the demand for information on surgical weight loss options is growing, Dr. Edward Lin of the Emory Bariatric Center has been taking big action to help educate the community. Today, he held an online chat on the topic of surgical weight loss options (check out the transcript) to help answer questions on the pros and cons of weight loss surgery and dig deeper into the differences between each type of weight loss surgery. Dr. [...]

A recent study found that family members living with patients who underwent weight loss surgery dropped significant amounts of weight and made more positive lifestyle changes.  In this study, 35 morbidly obese patients underwent Roux-en-Y gastric bypass surgery. Overweight spouses and family members living with the patient attended three lifestyle counseling sessions before surgery and five sessions after surgery. At these sessions, patients and their family members learned about healthy eating habits (portion control and a healthy diet) and how to increase physical activity. At one year after surgery, patients lost an average of 100 pounds and decreased their body mass index (BMI) from 48.7 to 33.3. In addition, their overweight spouses and family members lost an average of 10 [...]

Do: Get a Head Start

The first day of the New Year seems like the perfect day to start a new lifestyle, but why wait for a specific day to begin a healthier way of life?  Waiting may actually be doing more harm than good to your resolution.  The holiday temptations and the “I can indulge today/ this week/this month because I am going to lose weight in the New Year” mentality can actually set you back farther and make your resolution harder to achieve.  There’s no sense in putting off for later what you can start today.

Don't: Go to the Extreme

The most common reason that New Year’s resolutions fail is because they are too unrealistic.  It’s great to be motivated to improve your health, [...]

Recent studies have been examining whether the rate in which we eat influences our weight. In one study, researchers gave women pasta at two different times. The first time, they were told to eat quickly. The second time, they were encouraged to slowly chew each mouthful 15 to 20 times before swallowing. On average, women ate 67 fewer calories when they took time to chew their food. The authors of this study noted that cutting 67 calories at dinner translates into seven pounds of weight loss per year. Another similar study focused on examining how the speed of eating changes appetite and the rate of which food (energy) in our bodies is used. A calorimeter machine was used to measure how much energy a person burns throughout the day. On the first day, women ate lunch in a [...]

All of us know that the holidays can be a perilous time for those who wish to lose weight, with all the parties, family gatherings and food around us. It is part of our culture to overeat from Thanksgiving through Valentine's Day, and others around us are likely to do so. Moreover, the food consumed often is high in sugar and fat, and alcohol does not relieve hunger very well, and can cause us to be less in control and more inattentive. The following are some ideas to consider to help you control your weight during the holidays:

1. Remind yourself that our culture at large does not have to be your personal culture.
2. Make sure that your thinking and attitude are healthy.  Think of moderate eating during the holidays as a step [...]
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Reasons we are not Exercising and Strategies to Overcome all of the Excuses

Weight loss is not an easy task to accomplish.  Often times it involves a lifestyle change in which we are forced to change habits we have developed over a lifetime. Many of us have trouble incorporating physical activity into our daily routines and come up with a number of excuses as to why we are not going to do it.  It is time to combat these excuses with pre-contemplated strategies so these excuses cannot hold us back.

With that said, these are the top 5 excuses we hear most often for not exercising and tips to help you overcome excuses:

1) I'm Too Tired

• Wake up 30 minutes early and work out.  It will increase your energy for the rest [...]
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Let’s be honest. We all know we can overindulge during the holidays. Around Thanksgiving, especially, we’re so enticed by the variety of dishes and their endless quantities that we often forget what we’re really focusing on, our loved ones. In the spirit of the health and wellness of you and your family, we’re sharing with you a few ways you can cut unnecessary calories from your Thanksgiving menu, without cutting the flavor or fun!

Cutting Calories from Turkey & Meat Recipes

Your turkey doesn’t need a coating in a full tub of butter to be moist, nor does it require brining days in advance for flavor. The traditional turkey recipe packs in about 400 calories per serving.

If you swap out the brining process for a bit of white miso paste, and use a rub [...]

Losing weight is something that seems to be high on the list of to-dos of most American adults. Whether you set a New Years resolution each year, or find yourself trying one diet after another, the ultimate goal is to lose weight and keep it off. Many of us don’t have enough weight to lose to justify weight loss surgery, but are looking for a long term solution. While diets can work for some people, most popular diets assume that everyone is overweight for the same reasons and can lose weight following the same plan. From years of experience, we know that this is not true. That’s why we’ve launched the Your Weigh program, which gives you the opportunity to work with a team of medical professionals to construct a tailored weight [...]