{"id":34382,"date":"2014-01-07T23:19:59","date_gmt":"2014-01-07T23:19:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/?p=34382"},"modified":"2017-04-27T08:26:58","modified_gmt":"2017-04-27T13:26:58","slug":"lets-make-sense-ut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/health\/physical-health\/lets-make-sense-ut\/","title":{"rendered":"Let\u2019s Make Some Sense Out of This!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Too<\/a>Every so often, a piece of breaking health news sweeps the media and reaches the public through every major news network. \u00a0A couple of weeks ago, the following headline began rapidly circulating- \u201c’Healthy Obesity Is a Myth, Report Says.\u201d \u00a0Yes, one year after doctors finally declared obesity as a disease, and many years after the American Heart Association moved overweight and obesity from and \u201ccontributing factor\u201d to a full-fledged risk factor, only now do we hear that it is harmful to be obese. \u00a0One magazine took things so far that their writer\u2019s published article was titled \u201cYou Can\u2019t Be Fit and Fat.\u201d \u00a0As usual, some of the headlines were misleading and the study didn\u2019t even include exercise into the equation. Let\u2019s have a look at what the outcome of this study was to put it into perspective.<\/p>\n

In this Canadian study, researchers found that even without\u00a0high blood pressure,\u00a0diabetes\u00a0or other metabolic issues, overweight and obese people had higher rates of death,\u00a0heart attack\u00a0and\u00a0stroke\u00a0after 10 years compared with their thinner counterparts.<\/p>\n

“This data suggests that increased body weight is not a benign condition, even in the absence of metabolic abnormalities, and argues against the concept of healthy obesity or benign obesity,” said researcher Dr. Ravi Retnakaran, an associate professor of medicine at the University of Toronto.<\/p>\n

The terms \u201chealthy obesity\u201d and \u201cbenign obesity\u201d have been used to describe people who are obese but don’t have the abnormalities that typically accompany obesity, such as high blood pressure, high blood sugar and high cholesterol, Retnakaran explained. \u00a0“We found that metabolically healthy obese individuals are indeed at increased risk for death and cardiovascular events over the long term as compared with metabolically healthy normal-weight individuals,” he added.<\/p>\n

It is possible that obese people who appear metabolically healthy have low levels of some risk factors that worsen over time, as the researchers suggest in the report originally published December 3 in Annals of Internal Medicine.<\/p>\n

Dr. David Katz, director of the Yale University Prevention Research Center, welcomed the report. “Given the recent attention to the ‘obesity paradox’ in the professional literature and pop culture alike, this is a very timely and important paper,” Katz said. The obesity paradox says that obese people with chronic\u00a0diseases\u00a0have a better chance of survival than normal-weight individuals do.<\/p>\n

Some obese people appear healthy because not all weight gain is harmful, Katz said. “It depends partly on genes, partly on the source of calories, partly on activity levels, partly on hormone levels. Weight gain in the lower extremities among younger women tends to be metabolically harmless; weight gain as fat in the liver can be harmful at very low levels,” Katz noted.<\/p>\n

I think most experts today would agree that being overweight in it of itself is harmful. \u00a0Aside from contributing to diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol, being very overweight or obese can lead to fatty liver disease, sleep apnea, osteoarthritis, and emotional problems like depression. Yes, at some point, your musculoskeletal system will try to tell you that it wasn\u2019t created to schlep around all that extra weight. \u00a0You will feel it in your knees, back, hips, feet and ankles. You will experience it through aches and pains that can negatively impact your quality of life as you age. And just because you went to the doctor at age 50 and your blood test looked relatively good, when you carry around too much weight, those numbers can and usually will change rapidly.<\/p>\n

The biggest fault in this study is that it doesn\u2019t address the \u201cFit and Fat\u201d phenomenon. Physical activity is far, far more important than weight, as the results from the Aerobics Longitudinal Study (the biggest and most rigorous study on the topic) state. This study, conducted under the supervision of Dr. Steven Blair examined data on 43,265 participants enrolled in this study between 1979 and 2003 who filled out questionnaires about their lifestyle and medical history and also underwent physical exams, blood tests and a treadmill tests to gauge their cardiovascular fitness. The researchers categorized obese participants as \u201cmetabolically healthy\u201d if aside from their weight, they didn\u2019t suffer from insulin resistance,\u00a0diabetes, low levels of good cholesterol, high triglycerides and high blood pressure. Nearly half of the obese participants in the study qualified as metabolically fit.<\/p>\n

Compared with obese people who had at least two of the above markers of poor health, those who were obese but metabolically healthy had a 38% lower risk of early death from any cause. In fact, those who were fat but fit had no higher death risk than metabolically healthy normal weight participants. The problem with the current study is that it didn\u2019t differentiate between obese people who exercise and those who don\u2019t.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In Blair\u2019s study, those in the lowest fifth in terms of fitness had a death rate four times higher than participants ranked in the top fifth for fitness. \u00a0Dr. Blair states, \u201cBeing fit provides protection against mortality in these men and women 60 and older, whether they\u2019re normal weight, overweight, or obese.\u201d \u00a0In another study by Lee, Blair, and Jackson several years ago, 21,925 men of all shapes and sizes were assessed and monitored for eight years. \u00a0The study concluded that men, who were fit and fat actually had a lower mortality rate than men who were normal weight but unfit and sedentary. \u00a0One of the authors of this study is clinically obese, however, he runs 35 miles per week. \u00a0So the key here is \u201cfit,\u201d not necessarily thin.<\/p>\n

This latest research, highly touted and publicized, has its place- if you don\u2019t exercise and you are obese, it is dangerous, even if you blood pressure, your cholesterol and you blood sugar is all great! \u00a0But if you can manage to exercise while being obese, you\u2019re better off than a thin person, who doesn\u2019t exercise.<\/p>\n

One more thing to think about, if you are counting on being overweight or obese and being an exerciser, take it from this personal trainer who has trained many overweight people\u2014it isn\u2019t so easy to exercise and be fat. \u00a0You might have to do it, but it is a lot more pleasant to lose the weight while you are exercising with proper eating, proper sleep, good hydration and making sure your exercise program is balanced and safe for you to do.<\/p>\n

In the end of the day, working toward a normal weight together with exercise will. \u201cadd hours to your day, days to your year, and years to your life.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

\"image\"<\/p>\n

Alan Freishtat<\/strong> is an A.C.E. CERTIFIED PERSONAL TRAINER and a BEHAVIORAL CHANGE and WELLNESS COACH with over 19 years of professional experience. Alan is the creator and director of the \u201c10 Weeks to Health\u201d program for weight loss. He is available for private coaching sessions, consultations, assessments and personalized workout programs both in his office and by telephone and skype. Alan also lectures and gives seminars and workshops. He can be reached at\u00a002-651-8502<\/a> or 050-555-7175<\/a>, or by email at\u00a0alan@alanfitness.com<\/a> Check out the his web site \u2013www.alanfitness.com<\/a> US Line: 516-568-5027<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every so often, a piece of breaking health news sweeps the media and reaches the public through every major news network. \u00a0A couple of weeks ago, the following headline began rapidly circulating- \u201c’Healthy Obesity Is a Myth, Report Says.\u201d \u00a0Yes, one year after doctors finally declared obesity as a disease, and many years after the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":469,"featured_media":34384,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[85,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-inspiration","category-physical-health"],"yoast_head":"\nLet\u2019s Make Some Sense Out of This! - OU Life<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/life\/health\/physical-health\/lets-make-sense-ut\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Let\u2019s Make Some Sense Out of This! 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