In line with its mission, the Editorial Board of MedTvoiLokony makes every effort to provide reliable medical content supported by the latest scientific knowledge. The additional flag “Checked Content” indicates that the article has been reviewed by or written directly by a physician. This two-step verification: a medical journalist and a doctor allows us to provide the highest quality content in line with current medical knowledge.
Our commitment in this area has been appreciated, among others, by by the Association of Journalists for Health, which awarded the Editorial Board of MedTvoiLokony with the honorary title of the Great Educator.
Children will duplicate what we do as we eat. We, the adults, are role models for them. From an early age, you need to build healthy eating habits – says Katarzyna Walas, clinical nutrition specialist, psycho-dietician and coach.
Dorota Przerwa, MedTvoiLokony: How can obese be malnourished? If you are obese, you have eaten too much!
Katarzyna Walas: It’s all about body weight composition. A properly nourished person cannot have too much fat. Let’s take an example: we have two people – one muscular with a BMI of 30, which is well above the norm, and the other also with the same BMI, but the other person is fluffy. They both have the same BMI, but one is the top of muscle and the other is the top of body fat. In the case of the latter, there may be qualitative malnutrition, because we are talking about it.
What does qualitative malnutrition result in?
Adipose tissue is not indifferent to our body. These are cells that have metabolic processes that affect the body. The more fat there is, the more inflammation in the body becomes, as fat cells secrete substances that increase inflammation in the body. These are microstates, but the more of these fat cells, the more inflammation gets.
What happens then?
The higher the inflammation, the worse the body’s nutritional status. There are disorders of metabolism, digestion, absorption, appetite, etc. The fatter you are, the lower your nutritional status is. It begins to go into a vicious circle.
This phenomenon is clearly visible in seniors. Due to their age, the level of muscle tissue begins to decline, and the level of body fat naturally increases, metabolism decreases. Fat tissue begins to have a strong impact on the body, diseases appear. A similar relationship was noticed in children. If your baby starts to build fat, inflammation in the body will increase. The likelihood of civilization diseases, such as diabetes, atherosclerosis, etc., is also increasing. These diseases are largely related to nutrition.
By collecting fat mass, we work for a heart attack in the future.
Such children will be great candidates for a heart attack. When an obese person enters the doctor, metabolic disorders are immediately looked for, i.e. carbohydrate disorders, lipid disorders, plus hypertension. And when we have carbohydrate disorders, i.e. diabetes or the state of pre-diabetes, the state of glucose intolerance, the consequences of this are retinopathy, angiopathy, neuropathy. So patients, let me put it colloquially, stop seeing, their feet fall off [diabetic foot – ed.], Etc. These are the long-term consequences of poor nutritional status.
How to fix it?
I saw a fantastic social campaign in which a man is shown in an intensive care unit with a heart attack. Two figures stand over it. One says the patient came with this and that. The second person says it could have been avoided. Time is starting to go backwards and we see physical inactivity, highly processed food, sweet, fast food. These are the things that need to be eliminated.
Rich-calorie fast food can be found everywhere.
They are also tasty, and we like salty, sweet and fatty. In fast food it is all there is, fat is the carrier of flavor, so we like such bad food. As a rule, we are lazy, we do not want to bite, it is difficult to convince children to hard things, and fast food does not need to be bitten. It breaks away, presses against the palate and swallows. Salty, sweet, greasy and no need to chew. It would seem perfect.
How Do Children Teach Good Food?
We, the adults, are the role models for them. Children will duplicate what we do as we eat. Children need to build healthy eating habits: five meals a day, half of the plate is to be taken up by vegetables and fruit, 1/4 of the plate is a source of protein, 1/4 is a source of carbohydrates – porridge, rice, pasta, etc.
In Polish cuisine, the proportions are completely different.
We have been taught that we have a lot of potatoes on our plate, a cutlet and a bit of salad, just added for taste. This needs to be changed. If we follow a good model of nutrition, we will see the results soon. Our role is to show that healthy food can be tasty.
Of course, the so-called unhealthy foods, but they cannot be a ritual. When we spend time together, for example on a trip, and we add less valuable food, it will be associated with a fun time. In this way, we perpetuate the wrong model. So Sunday family fast food trips are out. A birthday with such food also, because bad food will be treated as a reward.
Research says that we have caught up with the obesity among children and adolescents in Western Europe. We reproduce bad eating habits. People must be taught that this is an investment in their bodies. They will feel better, they will be longer and more fit, more attractive.
It is impossible to be fit without exercise.
A child should have an hour of intense physical activity a day. One hour a day of regular exercise, like playing ball, swimming! Teenagers need at least 1,5 hours. An adult of this activity should have min. 150 minutes a week. That’s a lot. How many of us do that? And qualitatively malnourished young people need both physical activity and well-balanced food.
You have to instill good principles in children, motivate them, praise them, show good models. You need to mobilize to exercise, to choose healthy food, spend time with friends, e.g. cooking. We like to meet our friends in this way and the kids who are around us are already learning it. There is no alternative but education. Adults as walking examples of good behavior and showing children that physical activity can be fun.
It is important to make sure that the body fat is as much as it is according to the standards. Because we need it – for the production of hormones, for vitamins, etc. But it must be within the normal range. Then the body can easily cope with the ingredients that will be secreted by adipose tissue.
It is our body composition that determines whether we are properly nourished, overweight / obese or malnourished, and this is easily measured. There are standards that we should meet depending on age, gender, height and physical activity.