Ok, so apparently there are quite a few foods that can help you lose weight and shed excess pounds. A new study has just added tomatoes to the already long list.

While it’s a no brainer that fruits and vegetables are more likely to help you stay healthy than processed foods, researchers from the University of Reading have found that tomatoes can assist your weight-loss program because the lycopene found in them make you feel fuller (causing you to eat less).

Participants in the small study were given bread filled with cream cheese, enriched with carrot and enriched with tomato, and were asked to note how full they became after eating each. The results showed that the bread enriched with tomato was the most filling. A possible reason? Lycopene reduces your appetite hormones, hence the full feeling.

Although the study was only conducted with 17 participants, lead researcher Dr Julie Lovegrove told the Telegraph that the results were “statistically significant”.

Celeb Diet Doc..
What a ridiculous study? Bread filled with cream cheese doesn’t sound like a recipe for weight loss! I wouldn’t make any conclusions based on a study of only 17 participants. It also leads to a false mindset that weight loss is based on fat, carbs, protein… or in this case lycopene. Remember a lot of these “studies” are funded by companies looking to sell product. Oh and btw, tomatoes will help with weight loss..  as long as it’s not processed into say bread filled with cream cheese. LOL!

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Scoffing down that cheese burger or polishing off the last of those fries may make you feel satiated for now, but it could lead to depression later down the line. A new study shows that individuals who eat too much junk food tend to manifest depressive symptoms.

The study, which was published in the November issue of The British Journal of Psychiatry, noted that of the 3 486 male and female participants who ate the most high-fat foods, 58% were more likely to display signs of depression 5 years later. Dr Eric Brunner, one of the researchers, told The Daily Mail that diet seems to play an independent role in an individual’s mental health when taking exercise and lifestyle into consideration.

“If your diet is high in foods that make blood sugar levels go up and down like a yo-yo, then it’s not good for your blood vessels and is bound to have an effect on the brain,” Brunner told the news paper.

The researchers said a healthy diet plays a protective role in that the high levels of antioxidants in fruits and vegetables guard you against depression, just like folate in veggies like broccoli, cabbage, spinach, lentils and chickpeas. Fish is also high in polyunsaturated fatty acids.

So it’s finally been scientifically proven that eating a healthy, balanced diet not only improves your physical disposition, it also improves your mental one.

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Do you drink two or more diet sodas a day to keep the calories off? Beware; you may be getting your sugar-free treat, but you could also be doing some serious damage to your kidneys. A new study has shown that diet soda could as much as double your risk of deteriorating kidney function.

The study was presented this weekend in San Diego at the annual meeting of the American Society of Nephrology, and showed that even women who have healthy kidneys displayed a 30% decline in kidney function.

Lead researcher Julie Lin, assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a staff physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, studied more than 3 000 women who were already taking part in the Nurses’ Health Study over 11 years by comparing their dietary information and beverage intake with kidney function. Even after taking age, blood pressure, diabetes and physical activity into account, the study still showed that 11.4% of participants had a 30% or more decline in kidney function.

“With natural aging, kidney function declines about 1 milliliter per minute per year after age 40,” Lin told WebMD.

In the study, kidney function declined by 3 milliliters per minute per year. Unfortunately all the participants were women so researchers couldn’t say whether these findings hold true for men as well.

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Lucy Danziger, editor of Self magazine, is practicing what she preaches to her readers every month. She’s turned down the car service her publishers provide for her every morning, and has instead decided to ride her bicycle to work every day.

The New York Times recently ran a piece on the editor, saying that after Condé Naste closed down 4 of its titles and heavily clamped down on budgets on all the others, Lucy decided to give up the town car service and hop on her bike.

Lucy started with the company 8 years ago, and when she was provided with the service, wasn’t too fussed about it.

“I was like, ‘I don’t need a car’, then suddenly it’s pouring, and Mr. Newhouse [the Condé Naste chairman] is waiting, and you’re like, I need to get to work today,” she told the daily newspaper.

But the service isn’t always an ideal way to travel, says Lucy. She has had to anticipate what time she leaves her apartment because she still has to call the driver to let him know her departure time.

Lucy, however, seems to be enjoying her morning bike ride so far, but she knows she won’t be peddling through a snowstorm.

“It’s not an absolute,” she told newspaper. “It’s a very New York thing to do.”

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With the nation now fully focused on its alarming obesity crisis, more and more studies are being conducted in an attempt to find ways that help and encourage overweight individuals to lose weight and maintain a healthy lifestyle. One such study looks at the influence of weight-loss and exercise-related podcasts.

Published in the American Journal of Preventative Medicine, the Pounds Off Digitally study lead by Dr Gabrielle M Turner-McGrievy notes that certain types of podcasts (audio recordings played back on a portable music player or computer) can lead to greater weight-loss and a lower BMI.

Two groups of participants with a BMI between 25 and 40 were given 24 podcasts over a 12-week period. The first group listened to a regular weight-loss based program while the second were given “enhanced” weight-loss programs that focused on behavior therapy and social cognitive theory.

While the first group lost 2.1kg, the second group lost 3.5kg and also had a greater knowledge of weight-loss and exercise tips and was motivated to lose more weight. In their conclusion, the researchers noted that the study suggests that entertaining, behavior-therapy enhanced podcasts are a more effective way to promote weight loss than the regular, lecture-like ones.

Celeb Diet Doc..

No surprise here. If you target behaviors you’ll lose more weight over standard weight loss strategies which everyone knows but no one sticks with.

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If you’re having difficulty shifting your baby weight after trying diet after diet and workout trend after trend, why not become a Wii Mommy. Many mothers have joined an online community where they swop stories about how the Nintendo Wii Fit has helped them drop their post-baby weight.

Essentially a video game, the Wii Fit helps individuals lose weight with a series of fun exercises based on games. Julie Maloney lost 60 pounds over the course of a year using her Wii Fit Plus
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“Workout tapes, gym memberships; I tried everything and all I was doing was dumping my money and I was getting nowhere except upset,” Julie told Better TV. “I did the balance and aerobics. [With just] 10 minutes of hula hoop my weight shrank. I was just playing games and I was enjoying myself. There was no work involved. The next thing I know, I’m in a size 8.”

It’s hard to resist candy, but it’s even harder on Halloween. Whether you’re going out trick or treating with the kids or going to a party where you know there will be plenty of temptations.  Be prepared for sugar overload. Truth be told all candy is evil and will lead to accelerated aging, heart disease, diabetes, cancer and obesity.. and this is just a sampling of all the horrors that abound with sugar overload.

Trick or Treat?

Tricks:
5th Avenue (1 full-size bar) – 280 calories, 14g fat
Snickers (1 full-size bar) – 280 calories, 14g fat
Twix Caramel (2 bars) – 280 calories, 14g fat
Baby Ruth (1 full-size bar) – 280 calories, 13g fat
Butterfinger (1 full-size bar) – 270 calories, 11g fat
Milky Way (1 full-size bar) – 260 calories, 10g fat
Mr. Goodbar (1 full-size bar) – 210 calories, 14g fat

Treats:
Apple 50 calories, 0.2 g fat

Stay away from processed sugar!  Just have fun and skip the junk food.

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Halloween doesn’t only have to be about trick or treating and candy this year. Before you carve that pumpkin for Saturday, why not take it into your backyard and work out with it.

Holly Rigsby from FitYummyMummy.com has created 4 fun workouts you can do. All you need is a pumpkin, a pillow case and 15 minutes. The moves include pumpkin chops, the headless deadlift, the pumpkin plank, lunges with a twist, basic hops and lateral hops.

Click Here!

As President Barack Obama declared the swine flu pandemic sweeping the nation a National Emergency, USA Today reported that a link may have been found between the H1N1 virus and obese patients. A report released by Center for Disease Control and Prevention health officials last week found that in a study of 10 Michigan patients who were seriously ill, 9 were obese or extremely obese.

The CDC says obesity is unknown risk factor when it comes to the virus, but so far quite a high percentage of patients suffering from the severe flu are obese or seriously obese (a BMI of more than 30). A possible reason for this is that obese people are more vulnerable to other chronic illnesses which could weaken their immune system, leaving them defenseless against the H1N1 virus.

“Clinicians need to be aware that severe complications can occur in patients with the novel H1N1 virus, particularly in extremely obese patients,” Dr. Tim Uyeki, a flu expert at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in the USA Today report.

To date, more than 1 000 Americans have died from swine flu, while 20 000 more have been hospitalized because of the virus.

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The week may be nearly over, but you can still do your part during Fat Talk Free Week.

The Reflections: Body Image Program is running a week-long campaign to get women to stop “fat talking” and help change the perception of what is fat and what is healthy. The organization, together with Delta Delta Delta and other partners, are raising awareness across the nation of the dangers of “fat talk” and the effects it has on a woman’s self-esteem and confidence.

“10 million women are dealing with eating disorders in this country, which is more than are suffering from breast cancer. It’s time we take control over our own destinies, our own bodies, and our own inner dialogues,” the program says on its website. “We’re changing the conversation to create a more positive body image for ourselves, our mothers, our sisters, our daughters, and our friends.”

Now running in its second year, Fat Talk Free Week is inviting women of all ages across the country to remove the word “fat” from their vocabulary and help make a difference, if only for a week.

“Each day, women will be given a daily ‘charge’ of something positive they can do related to having a positive body image, while shining a spotlight on the issues and statistics of body image and eating disorders in women.”