How Dietitians Can Help
Dietitians are not useful just for weight-loss strategies. If you have risk factors for disease or a strong family history of disease, qualified dietitians can help you avoid or mitigate them.
They can show you smarter ways to eat so that you can better manage existing conditions such as high blood pressure and gout. Their expertise spans the various stages of the life cycle and they address concerns like sports nutrition, food allergies, kidney disease and vegetarian diets.
Depending on the country you live in, university-qualified health professionals with training to provide medical nutrition therapy are either called accredited practicing dietitians or registered dietitians. Think of them as your food doctors.
Prevention and Treatment
Research shows that diet and lifestyle improvements can prevent up to 90 per cent of chronic diseases. They are twice as effective as any therapy your doctor can offer.
If you’ve had a heart attack, the Lyon Diet Heart Study shows that you can cut your risk of a second one by up to 70 per cent by adopting a Mediterranean diet. Improving your food, how much you move and achieving modest weight loss can also prevent type 2 diabetes about twice as effectively as taking metformin, according to the Diabetes Prevention Program! If your doctor has threatened medication for high cholesterol, you can probably avoid it by enjoying a portfolio diet instead, proven to drop cholesterol by up to 30 per cent.
Using Lifestyle Medicine
While there is a place for more drastic measures, we have become too reliant on drugs and surgery. Many miss out on the great benefits afforded by simple lifestyle changes.
Your body has a remarkable ability to heal itself much faster and more effectively than previously thought, provided you choose to address the underlying causes. A dietitian will show you how.
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