Dr. Sonali is a certified fitness specialist from the American College of Sports Medicine.She runs a fitness consultancy, Santulan, providing lifestyle management programs for individuals and groups.Get your doubts cleared and see them featured on our FAQ page every thursday.

This week’s answers:

I am 24 year girl and my height is 5ft 3 inch and my body weight is 60.3kg. Earlier I was 52 kg but from last 2 years I am working in night shift and have gained 8 kg. I will be really happy if you can suggest me a diet chart to follow since I don’t stay at home my eating habit is very bad. My day starts at 2:30 or 3 in the after noon because I work from 6:00pm till 4:30am.
Stuti Sharan

Hi Shruti, thank you for writing to me
One of the main reasons for your weight gain is a disturbance in your biological clock, due to your work timings- since we cant do much about it, i do suggest some form of cardio exercise like walking for 15 to 20 minutes atleast thrice a week. You may want to start doing Suryanamaskar-6 in the beginning and build up.

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The idea that sex burns calories is nothing more than a myth, according to a new study.

Dr. David Allison, associate dean for science in the School of Public Health at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and his team have identified seven obesity-related myths that they said were not scientifically-backed by evidence.

One myth the researchers busted was that losing lots of weight rapidly might cause the weight to come back one day, whereas slow, gradual weight loss will accumulate over time to produce longer-lasting changes.

The researchers found evidence that people who lose more weight rapidly are more likely to weigh less, even after several years, CBS News reported.

The oft-told advice that people should set realistic weight loss goals or else they’ll become frustrated and not lose weight is a myth, according to the study, which cited data that people may actually do better with more ambitious goals.

Other major myths busted include the idea that breast-feeding may reduce a child’s risk for obesity.

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A study by investigators at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center has found that regular consumption of deep-fried foods such as French fries, fried chicken and doughnuts is associated with an increased risk of prostate cancer, and the effect appears to be slightly stronger with regard to more aggressive forms of the disease.

While previous studies have suggested that eating foods made with high-heat cooking methods, such as grilled meats, may increase the risk of prostate cancer, this is the first study

to examine the addition of deep frying to the equation.

Specifically, Janet L. Stanford, Ph.D., co-director of the Hutchinson Center’s Program in Prostate Cancer Research, and colleagues found that men who reported eating French fries,

fried chicken, fried fish and/or doughnuts at least once a week were at an increased risk of prostate cancer as compared to men who said they ate such foods less than once a month.

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Taking a brisk stroll daily can help lower your chances of getting Alzheimer’s disease, say scientists.

A team at the University of Nottingham has found that a stress hormone produced during a brisk stroll can protect the brain from memory loss, the Mirror reported.

The finding, published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, may also explain why people vulnerable to stress are at more risk of dementia.

Experts have been mystified why higher physical and mental activity can lower your chances of getting Alzheimer’s.

But the Nottingham University team has suggested that the key might be found in balancing the body’s level of the hormone CRF.

People with Alzheimer’s have a reduced level. But normal levels of CRF help the brain, keeping the mental faculties sharp.

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Snoring may put you at a greater risk than those who are overweight, smoke or have high cholesterol to have thickening or abnormalities in the carotid artery, researchers say.

The increased thickening in the lining of the two large blood vessels that supply the brain with oxygenated blood is a precursor to atherosclerosis, a hardening of the arteries responsible for many vascular diseases.

“Snoring is more than a bedtime annoyance and it shouldn’t be ignored. Patients need to seek treatment in the same way they would if they had sleep apnea, high blood pressure or other risk factors for cardiovascular disease,” lead study author Robert Deeb from Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit said.

“Our study adds to the growing body of evidence suggesting that isolated snoring may not be as benign as first suspected. So instead of kicking your snoring bed partner out of the room or spending sleepless nights elbowing him or her, seek out medical treatment for the snorer,” he said.

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Dr.Priyam Ahuja  is an anti obesity expert, a passionate diet and health consultant. She is practicing dietician and founder of ‘Diet of a Dietician’ TM, having extensive experience in nutrition counseling in fitness center, hospitals, community and sports professionals.

Priyam deals with obesity, hypertension, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, Heart diseases, stroke, forgetfulness, thyroid, PCOD, post pregnancy weight gain, eating disorders and lifestyle modifications.

If you have queries related to the above, send them to us and Dr.Priyam Ahuja will answer them in an exclusive chat with Sify.com on 31st January at 4 pm IST. Post your questions now!

Nutrition and Dietetics expert, Parvathy Radhakrishnan answers readers’ questions on nutrition. Get your doubts cleared and see them featured on our FAQ page every Wednesday.

Dear Madam,I am santosh and my age is 38 years, gender-male and married, my weight is 42 kg. only. Since almost ten years I have not gained weight instead lost some 5 kg., being economically very poor I can not afford medical expenses that is why never gone to show the doctor, somewhere I feel I am suffering from diabities because all the symptoms of this disease are very evident in me, pls. advise me how I can improve my health and lead a healthy life.
Thanks,Santosh

Santosh, if you feel you have diabetes then you need to see a doctor and get proper treatment. You may be losing weight due to diabetes. Without out doing a full blood test or checking for underlying illness it is not recommended to increase food intake especially if you suspect diabetes.Any government hospital will be able to help you at minimal cost. If you are a smoker please stop smoking. Smoking prevents weight gain.

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A new study led by an Indian origin scientist has revealed that smokers who quit by around age 40 can erase most of the risk of an early death.

While smokers who never stop lose about a decade of life expectancy, those who quit between ages 35 and 44 gained back nine of those years, according to the study.

The benefits of quitting smoking extend deep into middle age.

The study published online in the New England Journal of Medicine found that smokers who quit between 45 and 54 gained back six otherwise lost years, and those who quit between 55 and 64 gained four years, Washington post reported.

Moreover, quitting young, before age 35, erased the entire decade of lost life expectancy, the study revealed.

But Prabhat Jha, an epidemiologist at the Center for Global Health Research in Toronto, who led the study, said younger smokers should not be mistaken into thinking they can smoke until 40 and then stop without consequences because she added that the risks of lung cancer and other respiratory diseases linger for years after stubbing the last butt.

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Scientists at the University of California, Berkeley have for the first time found a link between poor sleep, memory loss and brain deterioration in older adults.

They have found that the slow brain waves generated during the deep, restorative sleep we typically experience in youth play a key role in transporting memories from the hippocampus – which provides short-term storage for memories – to the prefrontal cortex’s longer term “hard drive.”

However, in older adults, memories may be getting stuck in the hippocampus due to the poor quality of deep ‘slow wave’ sleep, and are then overwritten by new memories, the findings suggested.

Their discovery opens the door to boosting the quality of sleep in elderly people to improve memory.

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Yoga, the 5,000-year-old Indian practice, has positive effects on mild depression and sleep complaints, even in the absence of drug treatments, and improves symptoms associated with schizophrenia and ADHD in patients on medication, according to a systematic review of the exercise on major clinical psychiatric disorders.

The review of more than one hundred studies focusing on 16 high-quality controlled studies looked at the effects of yoga on depression, schizophrenia, ADHD, sleep complaints, eating disorders and cognition problems.

Benefits of the exercise were found for all mental health illnesses included in the review, except for eating disorders and cognition problems as the evidence for these was conflicting or lacking.

Dr. P. Murali Doraiswamy, a professor of psychiatry and medicine at Duke University Medical Center, US, and author of the study, explained that the emerging scientific evidence in support of yoga on psychiatric disorders is “highly promising” and showed that yoga may not only help to improve symptoms, but also may have an ancillary role in the prevention of stress-related mental illnesses.

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