Category Archives: Health And Body

How Your Dental Health Affects Your Entire Body

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It used to be a person saw their physician for their healthcare needs and their dentist for their dental care needs. These days, a person realizes their dental health effects and is a reflection of the rest of their health. Dentists are often able to predict a person’s overall health just by providing them regular dental care. Likewise, if your physician is treating a problem he or she may also be able to predict problems with your dental health. Your dental health is closely connected to your overall health. A healthy mouth is a reflection of overall good health and when your teeth are healthy, you feel better. The reverse is true, too. If you are suffering from dental problems, it can affect how your entire body feels. It can also be a predictor of other problems that are sometimes quite serious. Those who suffer from snoring problems may need to visit a sleep apnea clinic and they may find their problems are related to their dental health. Something as simple as Invisalign can straighten your teeth and improve your health.

Recently, doctors have discovered there is a connection between dental health and heart diseases. Chances are diet plays a role in this connection because those who eat poorly are going to damage their teeth and eventually, damage their heart. However, there may be deeper connections as well and researchers are trying to fully understand the connection in hopes of being able to prevent heart disease as early as possible.

Poor eating habits can do more than harm the healthy. Many of the foods that are bad for your teeth are bad for your overall health. Sugary snacks are high in calories and offer very little nutritional value. Not to mention they rot your teeth. Even diet sodas and juices which often have no calories are bad for your dental and overall health. The acid in soda erodes tooth enamel and the chemicals and sugar substitutes may create problems in the rest of your body. Finally, high fat foods have a tendency to clog your arteries and often lead to bad breath. A simple rule to follow is that if something is bad for your teeth, it is probably bad for you in general.

Often, dental problems and health issues are related. If you have been suffering from headaches on the regular basis, it could be dental issues causing the problem. If you are experiencing pain in your face, ears or head make sure you visit the dentist to rule out possible problems.

Finally, if you have severe dental issues, it can lead to a variety of frightening issues in the rest of your body. If a tooth gets infected, it may feel like mild pain in your mouth, but the infection can spread to the rest of your body. Be sure to keep up with regular dental visits and speak with your dentist about the health of your teeth. This helps you avoid more serious problems that can lead to expensive medical bills, pain, and serious consequences.

The Importance of Health and Body Image

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We see images in the media almost every day of what the ‘perfect’ body ‘should’ look like. Today’s teens in particular are assaulted on television, in magazines or on the Internet with images of the ‘perfect’ body. Our body image is often based on what others look like or what we perceive others look like and how that relates to our goals and aspirations for our bodies.

What is body image? Our body image is just that… an image of what we see as our bodies. It’s the way we think about our body and how we think others see it. This awareness and perception is often based on appearance and function. People with a good body image will often see themselves as attractive to others while those with a poor body image will see themselves as unattractive or even repulsive to others.

Body image isn’t unchanging. It is ever ever-changing and commonly not based on fact but rather determined by our self-esteem and psychological in nature. Our body image is sensitive to our emotions, our moods, our water weight retention. We ascertain how to comprehend our body image through interaction with our families and friends but this only reinforces what is acquired culturally.

Our body image is also not grounded on the opinions of others. While some people with great body image may be thought of as unattractive by others while those with a poor image of their bodies might be rated as extremely attractive.

In today’s media driven culture, women are starving themselves and their children, they binge eat or binging and purging. Their children are watching closely to learn what is body image and how to integrate it into their lives. When children are learning from parents whose body image is closely tied to what they perceive as perfection it is no wonder that we are raising a generation of children who aspire to perfection to the point they become anorexic, starve themselves, constantly diet and never eat a nutritious well-balanced diet.

Particularly in their teen years young girls self-esteem is intimately linked to their body image. Self-esteem is how much value people place on themselves, their pride and how worthwhile they feel in themselves. Body image is often tied to self-pride for young teenage girls.

To alter your body image you don’t need to change the way you look, feel, act or live – but you do have to change the way you think of yourself and how attractive you consider yourself to be. Your body is yours. You can’t replicate the current top model and they can’t duplicate you. Nor do you want to because without variety this world would be pretty darned tedious. First be certain that your weight is within healthy bounds and then set about altering what you can and learning to value the diversity of the rest. For example, you can’t change your shoe size or your height but if you feel your legs are too flabby it isn’t something that several hours a week in the gym won’t cure.

The actual goal should always be your health and not your body image. Whether you are undertaking to achieve a healthy weight or healthy toned body the goal should be health. When you take your eyes off of the half-starved, lipo-suctioned, surgically enhanced television stars you’ll realize that your body is beautiful.

When you hear yourself saying negative things about yourself – STOP! You can be your own worst enemy and your biggest fan, rather chose to be your biggest fan.

Women’s Wellness Series – Body Composition and Health

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A lean, well-toned figure is something that most of us aspire to – and the ideal of a youthful body shape motivates many of us to go to the gym, sign up for fitness classes, and keep an eye on our diets. But body composition and body shape are about more than just looking good: they are also closely related to our health. With optimal body composition, including a high ratio of lean body mass to fat, you minimize your risk of developing diseases that are related to obesity and how your body fat is distributed.

Your weight is composed of two separate elements: fat and lean body mass (muscle, bone, organs, and fluids). Generally speaking, the quality of your weight (what proportion of your weight is fat or “percent body fat”) is more significant to your health than the quantity of your weight (total pounds).

The Body Mass Index (BMI) is widely used to assess the increased risk of weight-related conditions, based on a ratio of weight to height. However, appearances can be deceptive when it comes to estimating body fat percentage. Heavily muscled people, like football players, can be overweight according to the BMI table without being over fat. On the other hand, some people who appear to be lean and are of normal weight according to the chart can be qualitatively measured as over fat.

The scale cannot differentiate between fat pounds and muscle pounds. What tells the tale then is not total weight, but body composition. A good way to determine body composition is by skinfold measurements. Since excess fat accumulates at specific locations just below the skin, we use calipers to measure the thickness of skin and underlying fat at these sites.

There are no universally accepted norms for body composition. The ideal amount of body fat varies with each individual depending on age, gender, fitness level and genetic profile. A range of 10-22% body fat for men and 20-32% for women is considered satisfactory for health.

The distribution of fat on your body depends on your total amount of body fat and your genes. Are you an apple or a pear? Studies show that a large waist circumference (apple) signals a greater risk of heart disease and diabetes than ample hips and thighs (pear). The deep abdominal fat packed around the vital organs is metabolically very active, allowing fatty acids to move easily into and out of the cells. Once stored in the liver, they can interfere with its ability to regulate glucose and insulin levels, contributing to high cholesterol, triglyceride and blood pressure levels. A waist measurement of 35 inches (89 cm) or more is considered a risk factor for women, 41 inches (104 cm) for men.

Research shows that exercise reduces the size of fat cells in the belly more effectively than dieting alone. It also prevents fat from being stored in the organs and muscles. Weight loss from exercise is primarily fat loss. As you exercise regularly, you will reduce fat stores from the whole body, and you will develop leaner, toned muscles instead. The gain in lean muscle tissue and loss of excess fat will result in trimmer contours and smaller circumferences regardless of the number of pounds lost.