Nudge-it

 

 

In the developed world food is abundant and we must make choices about our food - choices in what we eat, dosage how much we eat and when we eat. But with these choices come problems. It can be hard to make healthy decisions, often foods that are inexpensive and convenient contain a large number of calories, in consequence the levels of overweight and obesity are high and rising. This has clear consequences on our health; not just diseases like diabetes and high blood pressure, but psychiatric problems like anxiety and depression.

These health problems are accompanied by huge social and economic costs: they affect individuals in the midst of their working lives, impoverishing families through time lost at work and impaired employment prospects. Stress can add to these pressures, and can enhance the vicious cycle of weight-gain through “comfort eating”.

The factors that drive food choice are poorly understood. Nudge-it is devoted to developing and implementing novel scientific approaches to better understand this problem and provide evidence-based solutions.

Nudge-it is a truly inter-disciplinary project. Partners’ experience encompasses neurobiology, neuroimaging, computational modelling, economics and public policy.
 

Topics Nudge-it are currently working on include:

- “Mindless” eating 

-  To eat or not to eat? 

-  Why do we eat more (or less) when we feel different emotions? 

-  Snacking - a cause of weight gain? 

-  The neurobiology of food choices in hunger and satiety 

-  How do we choose what to eat? 

- The importance of early-life experience 


Nudge-it is a European Commission-funded FP7 project bringing together dozens of scientists from 16 institutions across six European countries, the US and New Zealand. The project engages internationally leading experts in the neurobiology of motivational behaviour, reward and regulation of appetite, experimental psychology, functional brain imaging, behavioural economics and computational modelling.

The project will develop innovative tools that link understanding across these interacting disciplines. The overall aim is to better understand decision-making in food choice and to build predictive models to contribute to improving public health policy.
 

Please visit www.nudge-it.eu for more information

 

Beat Emotional Overeating Survey



Beat Emotional Overeating Survey

This anonymous survey is aimed at those who binge eat, compulsively overeat, feel they have emotional eating issues and are overweight or obese or struggling with their weight. 

Why we are doing this survey 

Data from the survey will form part of a national campaign to raise awareness of how emotional overeating and being overweight or obese is addressed by professionals and how services could be improved.

Beat have been funded by the Department of Health to set up 45 ‘Emotional Overeating Support Groups’ by March 2016. These groups are free to attend, require no referral or weighing and give you the option to attend as often or as seldom as you would like. These groups are for people aged 18 or over and are run across the East and West Midlands and East Anglia alongside online support. They are peer support groups and do not offer counselling, therapy or advice but are a safe space for adults to communicate and share experiences and support one another. The groups are run once a month by a minimum of two trained Beat facilitators. For more information please go to www.b-eat.co.uk or email us at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

The survey

Please note: this survey should take approximately 5-10 minutes to complete. This survey will be closing on Thursday 5th June. You can return to previous pages to alter answers, but it is not possible to exit the survey and return to complete it at a later date. Please click here to take part.

 


Hydration for Health - Healthy hydration & obesity


According to WHO, viagra dosage overweight and obesity are now the fifth leading risk for global deaths: in 2008, viagra over 500 million adults were obese. Living a healthy lifestyle is key component of the fighting against obesity. Promoting physical activity, drug healthy nutrition and healthy hydration can contribute to maintaining healthy body weight. Adopting healthy hydration habits is not only a matter of “how much to drink” but also the quality of what we drink is important.

Excessive and regular intake of beverages containing sugar increases the energy intake compared to drinking water. Studies have shown that excessive and regular sugar-sweetened beverages intake can lead to increased body weight. Whereas water is calorie free, one glass of sugar-sweetened beverage (250 ml) contains about 100 kcal. Excessive consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages can quickly exceed the World Health Organization recommendation which states that free / added sugar (from all nutrition sources) should not exceed 10% of the total calorie intake.

There is increasing evidence that the types of the fluids we drink can have a long-term impact on health, influencing the development of overweight, obesity or metabolic diseases. Studies have suggested that excessive consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages increases the risk of type 2 diabetes and it has also been shown that in adults, high consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages is associated with the prevalence of metabolic syndrome.A sensible advice would be to recommend that the bulk of daily fluid intake should come from plain water.

See more at: http://www.h4hinitiative.com/hydration-and-health/healthy-hydration-obesity


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Additionally, please note that the deadline for the H4H Young Researcher Award is 1st May 2014. 

The Hydration for Health Initiative invites young researchers in the field of healthy hydration to submit abstracts focusing on novel research that contributes to the scientific field of hydration and health.  

Submission of abstracts is encouraged in, but not restricted to, the following areas: hydration markers, hydration and health in general and kidney health in particular, hydration and cognition, hydration, behaviour and well-being, fluid and water intake studies. 

For more information on the award, please click here or email:  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

 

Doctoryourself

Doctoryourself logo

There is no magical cure and ageing is universal. The only way to grow old with a reasonable quality of life is to follow some simple principles. Look after your body by eating the right food, do not overload it with toxins and stay mobile. 

Doctoryourself.

Doctoryourself has been born out of recognising how little the medical profession can do to help when the damage is already done. Treating High Blood Pressure and Diabetes with medication of course is helpful and will prolong life but most drugs have side effects. It is always more difficult to reverse a problem,  which could have been avoided in the first place.

Doctoryourself believes that making the individual more aware of the many implications of the lack of exercise; they might just find the impetus to take on that task. 

Doctoryourself believes that the message has to be simple and powerful. People need to realise that everything they do has got consequences, that getting older means working harder in order to keep the body in shape, they might well be persuaded to change their habits and live healthier.

Reduce the risk of avoidable diseases. Doctoryourself.
 

Dr. Winfried Brenneis, GP