Interview

On this day, we met with the nutritionist Alejandro Martinez, a specialist in eating habits, and we made a couple of questions about trans fat and about diet in general that a person should have, this is what he told us .

Q: How many fruits we have to eat in a day?

A: 5 fruits and vegetables per day, ideally of different colors.

Q: How many days we have to do exercise in a week?

A: Between 3 and 4 days in a week, cause is important to have a rest.

Q: I’d like to know how many liters of water we need to drink in a day?

A: We have to consume between 1 and 2 liters for day, this measure could change in each person.

Q: Do you know what trans fats are?

A: There are two broad types of trans fats found in foods: naturally-occurring and artificial trans fats.

Naturally trans fats are produced in the gut of some animals and foods made from these animals (e.g., milk and meat products) may contain small quantities of these fats.

 Artificial trans fats are created in an industrial process that adds hydrogen to liquid vegetable oils to make them more solid.

Q: I’d like to know how trans fats affect my health?

A: Trans fats raise your bad cholesterol levels and lower your good cholesterol levels. Eating trans fats increases your risk of developing heart disease and stroke. It’s also associated with a higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

Q: Which foods contain trans fats?

A: Trans fats can be found in many foods – including fried foods like doughnuts, and baked goods including cakes, pie crusts, frozen pizza, cookies, crackers, and stick margarines and other spreads. You can determine the amount of trans fats in a particular packaged food by looking at the Nutrition Facts panel.

Q: What are the foods that contains more trans fats?

A: French fries, anything fried or battered, pie and piecrust, margarine sticks, shortening, cake mixes and frostings.

Q: Do you have any idea of how much trans fats can I eat in a day?

A: The OMS recommends cutting back on foods containing partially hydrogenated vegetable oils to reduce trans fat in your diet and preparing lean meats and poultry without added saturated and trans fat.

Q:Could you tell me how can I limit my daily of trans fats?

A: Read the Nutrition Facts panel on foods you buy at the store and, when eating out, ask what kind of oil foods are cooked in. Replaces the trans fats in your diet with monounsaturated or polyunsaturated fats.

Q: How can we avoid them?

A: Cut back on fried, processed and commercial foods, choose liquid vegetables oils and soft tubs of margarine that contains little or no trans fats, buy all-natural peanut butter, because a main source of trans fat comes from non-natural peanut butter.

How to be more active:

Sometimes, the lack of time is an obstacle for having a healthy and active life. However, it is very important to add physical activity in our life.

The first step is promise yourself to comply your goals, and exercise daily, in this way, you could see changes soon. When you are sure about yours purposes, go to see a doctor to tell you your physical status to don’t take any risk.

1.- If you decide to exercise with walks, the ideal is to start with a short 10 minutes, then move to 15, then 20 and so on, until you reach the time, until you get used to doing this activity. Soon you’ll notice that you can walk more and more, you’ll feel much more active and feel better about yourself.

2. - If you want a more didactic and entertaining activity, you can choose the dance, to get used to dancing daily. You can choose between different rhythms until you find that you really like

3. - Maybe you don’t like to do activities alone, therefore, a good option is to invite your friends, family or a neighbor to carry out daily exercises.

4. - It is very important to wear appropriate clothing to exercise, because in this way you will be more comfortable and you can move more freely. In addition, you will not run the risk of harm body. Maybe at the beginning you will ashamed to use this type of clothing, but then you get used to doing it and not bother.

5. - One of the sports that are very well recommended is swimming, because it involve a lot of muscles throughout the body. If you have no knowledge about this sport you can go to an academy or school to obtain the necessary knowledge. At the beginning your muscles don´t practicing this sport, so chances are you hurt a lot, until they get used to doing the exercises and the pain will go away.

6. - You can start with 20 minutes of daily activity. This time is enough, because if you try hard to much, you could damage muscles, so have to do it for long enough so that your heart rate feel the benefits of your new active lifestyle time and your body get used to doing that.

7. - A reason why sometimes you have little encouragement, is mild dehydration, which is due to the lack of water. If you get used to drinking water constantly, you will notice a positive change, you'll feel more energy.

8. - If you don´t like competing or noise of the city, you should go to the forest and enjoy nature with long walks and start hiking. Enjoy nature and beautiful landscapes looking for good stretches in your community, national or provincial parks with excellent panoramas or stretches, and in this way you will get used to soon.

9.- If you get used to eating healthily, adding fruits and vegetables, you also get used to having more energy too, because these foods provide us with nutrients and vitamins needed to activate our body and thus be able to perform daily activities.

10.- You get used to cycling. Cities are more friendly to cyclists than ever. Most have special bike lanes and drivers are becoming more aware of cyclists. Go to a specialist to buy the perfect bike for the ski shop, but could buy a mountain bike and start going unpaved roads if you live in an area with good paths.

Trans Fat

Trans Fat

According to medicinenet.com, trans fat are “An unhealthy substance, also known as trans fatty acid, made through the chemical process of hydrogenation of oils. Hydrogenation solidifies liquid oils and increases the shelf life and the flavor stability of oils and foods that contain them.” [retrieved on may 17, 2016 from http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=11091]. There are two types of trans fat in foods: naturally-occurring and artificial, the last one is very comun because is easy to use, inexpensive to produce and last a long time. Also, trans fats give foods a desirable taste and texture, so it’s very popular and it’s very favorable for sellers.

Trans fats increase the levels of bad cholesterol (LDL), therefore eating foods with high levels of trans fats can cause health problems. For example, if somebody had eaten a lot of fried food, he/she would have risked of developing heart disease and stroke. It’s also associated with a higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes. In fact, according to medicinenet.com, “In the realm of dietary dangers, trans fats rank very high. It has been estimated that trans fats are responsible for some 30,000 early deaths a year in the United States. Worldwide the toll of premature deaths is in the millions.” [retrieved on may 17, 2016 form http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=11091]

There’s a lot of food that contain trans fat, and how we said before, they are very popular. According to the American Heart Association, “Trans fats can be found in many foods – including fried foods like doughnuts, and baked goods including cakes, pie crusts, biscuits, frozen pizza, cookies, crackers, and stick margarines and other spreads.” [retrieved on may 17, 2016 from http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/HealthyLiving/FatsAndOils/Fats101/Trans-Fats_UCM_301120_Article.jsp#.VzzGa_nhDIU].

We need to avoid the consumption of foods that contain trans fat. One way to do this is to be very stric when buying food. If you see the Nutrition Facts panel in a particular packaged food, you can determine the amount of trans fat that it has. According to the World Health Organization, it is recommended up to 1% of your total caloric intake, this constitutes a maximum consumption of 2 to 2.5 grams of trans fat per day taking as reference a average diet of 2000 to 25000 calories. [retrieved on may 17, 2016 from http://www.vitonica.com/alimentos/grasas-trans-lo-que-tienes-que-saber]