Your weight
Expert advice to help you maintain a healthy weight
Dissatisfied with your weight?
We're bombarded with scare stories about weight, from size zero to the obesity 'epidemic'. But a healthy weight is determined by different factors for each of us. Our expert advice is designed to help you achieve and maintain a healthy, life-enhancing weight.
Overweight or underweight?
Being the right weight has a positive effect on wellbeing but also on our health, as being the wrong weight can cause a range of medical problems.
Maintaining health as we age can be challenging, so a diet rich in nutrients is increasingly important as we grow older.
Factors that affect nutrition
There are many factors that influence nutritional status in older adults, and they can be broadly grouped into four main areas:
Those that naturally occur during the ageing process, such as a reduced ability to absorb nutrients efficiently, or a sore mouth due to dentures
Disease-specific conditions such as cancer, which place greater nutritional demands on people
Some drugs that interact with nutrients and prevent absorption, for example aspirin, which can interfere with the absorption of vitamin C
Social influences, such as not being able to get to shops, or social isolation
Continuing to enjoy food and to eat a diet that maintains nutritional status is key to coping with illness. Poor nutrition has been shown to increase the risk of infections, bed sores, chest infections and poor wound healing. Good nutritional status will help ensure a quicker recovery.
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