Weight management

Nutrition is an important part of maintaining a healthy body weight.

Weight management is a long-term approach to a healthy lifestyle. It includes a balance of healthy eating and physical exercise to equate energy expenditure and energy intake. Developing healthy eating habits while using tips that will keep us fuller longer can be useful tools in weight management. Knowing what your body needs is important to weight management and can control overconsumption and underconsumption of food. Weight management does not include FAD diets that promote quick, temporary weight loss. It focuses on the long-term results that are achieved through slow weight loss, followed by retention of an ideal body weight for age, sex and height. Weight management is important because rising obesity rates are a major concern in North America. About 60% of Canadians are overweight or obese.^[1] Obesity is a risk factor for many chronic diseases such as Type 2 diabetes, hypertension and cardiovascular disease.^[2] Managing one’s weight is one factor in preventing such chronic diseases.

Methods of Weight Management

Increase protein especially at breakfast

The satiating property of dietary protein is influenced by the time of protein consumption. Studies have shown that protein intake at breakfast has a greater satiety effect than later meal times.^[3] There are several explanations as to why this is the case. Firstly, protein has a greater thermogenic affect than carbohydrates and fat, which enables the body to burn more calories.^[4] Secondly, a high protein breakfast appears to slow gastric emptying, which attributes to the fact that protein appears to be the most satiating macronutrient.^[5] Finally, a high protein breakfast increases the activity of glucagon,^[5] which activates the pathways for glucose synthesis. One study showed that fat loss was approximately twice as much in the high-protein diet group than the moderate-protein diet group in overweight and obese individuals.^[4]

Use a smaller plate

Plate size can affect calorie consumption

Using smaller plates helps to consume smaller portion sizes and this leads to the consumption of fewer calories.^[6] Studies have shown that portion size influences energy intake.^[7] People who are presented with larger portions do not report to have a higher level of satiety, which suggests that hunger and satiety signals are ignored when a large portion of food is placed in front of them.^[7] In particular, one study showed that participants consumed 31% less calories with the small portion sized of a 6-inch submarine sandwich compared with the large portion size of a 12-inch submarine sandwich.^[7] Increased portion sizes have occurred simultaneously with the increase in obesity rates; hence, large portion sizes can be one of the factors contributing to the current increase in body weight of the US.^[7]

Eat more soup

Soups have a significant satiety effect and studies have demonstrated that compared to solid foods, soup ingestion decrease the amount of energy intake.^[8] Compared to having no soup, it has been shown that eating soup reduces total energy intake of a meal.^[9] When soup is consumed before a meal, a decrease of 20% of energy is consumed in the meal.^[9]

Choose the low calorie foods

A moderate decrease in caloric intake will lead to a slow weight loss, which may be more beneficial for long term weight management.^[10] For example, choosing a black coffee instead of a full fat latte will save calories that will add up in the long run. Low fat meats reduce the total amount of calories and cholesterol consumed.^[11] For example, traditional beef patties have 19.2% fat and 272 kcal per 100 g of meat. On the other hand, lean beef patties have 9.8%fat and 196 kcal.^[11]

Eating more dairy can aid in fat loss

Studies have shown that a diet high in dairy decreases total body fat.^[12] This occurs because a high amount of dietary calcium increases the amount of energy and fat excreted from the body.^[13] Studies have shown that saturated, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats all have a higher excretion rate with a high calcium intake.^[14] In these studies, a high calcium intake is considered 2300 mg and a low calcium intake is considered 700 mg.^[14] A possible explanation