Make Small Changes To Eating Habits Rather Than Diet To Lose Weight Successfully

Researchers from Liverpool and Oxford universities have reported that rates of obesity could be reduced and health improved if people made small changes to their diets. There is an ever growing number of obese and overweight people. However, many of these could regain a healthy weight with a few small changes rather than a large drastic change.

It is generally agreed that diet plans fail because they are too much of a drastic change from a persons previous eating habits. Although diets such as the Atkins, Mediterranean and Zone diet do help people to lose weight, few people ever maintain these diets as part of a new lifestyle, so the lost weight is regained and the person then gives up on dieting, believing it to be pointless.

Typical small changes can include:

Adding less salt to food
Stopping snacks between meals, especially crisps/chips, chocolate and soda drinks
Eating more fruits each day
Eating less saturated fat
Eating more healthy fats

These small changes can help to reduce cholesterol levels and blood pressure, both of which contribute to heart attack and stroke which account for tens of thousands of deaths each year. The researchers emphasized that the biggest gain in health would be from avoiding trans fats.

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The research in question has not been published yet, but was discussed at the annual heart disease conference in San Francisco which is run by the American Heart Association.

Remember that there are really two separate aspects to diet: health and weight management. It is possible to eat too much healthy food and still be overweight or obese to the point that you are unhealthy. However, most people do tend to eat too much unhealthy food. Both have the added problems caused by being overweight.

So do yourself a favor and make some little changes to the way you live your life to help lose weight. Swap a burger for a salad, swap chips for some fruit, swap soda for a glass of water. Little changes go a long way.