Search for tag: "eat"

Interviewer: You've decided you want to eat healthier, maybe become more physically active, or quit an unhealthy habit. The next step is to take action.

But Dr. Jennwood Chen says to succeed, don't try to change too much at once.

Dr. Chen: That intention to make a change needs to be realistic. And for some people cutting a whole liter of soda out of their daily routine is not that realistic. So cutting it down to a half liter a day for a while and then weaning yourself off it is a more realistic thing.

Interviewer: Dr. Chen says making even small changes when adopting new health habits can be hard. You will slip up, but strive for progress, not perfection. And be sure to celebrate when you do make progress.

Dr. Chen: You've got to pat yourself on the back and you should, you know, tell your family, you should tell your friends, and you should be proud of yourself really, you know. And that's how we just do . . . that's how we stay on the path.

Scot: All right. We're back with Thunder Jalili. He's our resident nutrition expert. And we're going to throw out another one of these things you might see on the internet, or some of this common sense, or, you know, something that you've believed for a long time. And we're going to find out if it's truth or if Thunder is going to debunk it on "Truth or Thunder-Debunked." Thunder, are you ready for your challenge today?

Thunder: I hope so.

Scot:: All right. Does eating at night really cause weight gains? Because there's this kind of, I think, this wisdom that you eat late at night and that's what's going to cause weight gains if you're eating like right before bed or something like that. So is that truth, or are you going to Thunder-debunk it today?

Thunder: No, I actually think there's truth to that.

Scot: What?

Thunder: Yeah.

Troy: Good, I was going to say don't tell me this is not true, because my whole takeaway from all our discussions is that this is true.

Scot: All right. Well, go ahead and explain.

Thunder: We talked in earlier podcasts about kind of the length of time that you eat, in terms of like what time do you eat in the morning when you wake up and then kind of when in the day you stop eating. And as we eat, our insulin levels go up, and that's kind of the hormone to store nutrients like fat.

So people that do that late-night snacking, you know, they've got to have something at, you know, 10:00, 11:00, 12:00 at night, maybe even later, they're kind of extending that whole time that they're putting calories into their system, and their insulin levels are high. So that's a recipe for, you know, storing fat.

So one of the ways that we would, like, advise somebody if they want to try to lose weight, you know, what are some easy steps I can think about, well, one of the easy steps is try not to eat after dinner, you know. Then you kind of have a longer time period where your body can go into that natural fasting state overnight and that helps us control our weight.

Troy: See, I'm so glad you said that, Thunder, because I have now, after all of these discussions we've had about this, I now watch the clock. I don't eat after 8:00, and sometimes it is a rush to get calories in before 8:00 p.m. I admit it's a little weird, but sometimes I am just like, okay, gotta eat, gotta eat, gotta eat. Okay, it's 8:00, I'm done.

Scot: So if you do work later, though, let's say you don't start eating until 6:00 p.m. and you shut it down at midnight. You're eating at night. Is that going to cause weight gains? Is there something about the night, or is it really just about that time of eating and not eating?

Thunder: It's not . . . there's nothing special about night. It's about the time period.

Troy: So maybe it was Thunder-debunked then. So it's nothing about the night in general. It's more just that period between when you last ate and when you eat again.

Thunder: Yeah. Oh, that's true. I guess in that sense it could be debunked. I guess I was assuming most people, you know, do have kind of a more regular schedule of having, you know, three meals, more or less, a day and then throwing snacks in there. So the night snacking, when I hear that, I assume that the person is, you know, kind of doing that normal, three-meals-a-day thing. But, yeah, to your point, if that's not you, if your first meal doesn't come until 4:00 in the afternoon, then, by all means, eat at 10:00.

Dr. Gellner: Newborns have a time schedule all their own, and often it does not match what the parents are used to. How and when should new parents try to get their baby on a sleep schedule?

Announcer: Keep your kids healthy and happy. You are now entering the "Healthy Kids Zone" with Dr. Cindy Gellner on The Scope.

Dr. Gellner: Newborns have spent their whole existence in a dark space with no agenda except to develop and grow, being fed through the umbilical cord, peeing. That's what amniotic fluid is unborn baby pee. Not pooping and not using their lungs. So when they're born, all of a sudden they've got to adjust and figure out how to eat, breathe, poop, and when to be awake according to our schedules.

Babies can't tell time, so they don't know when they're supposed to be alert, when to sleep, when to eat, and so one of the jobs of a new parent is helping their new little person adjust to the outside world. Sounds easy, right? Just ask any new parent, and they'll tell you it's anything but easy. Babies think that 3:00 a.m. is a great time to be up. They think that daytime naps are good because you as a parent can get so much done while they sleep.

For the first few days of their little lives, new parents will be at the mercy of their babies in terms of time schedules. By about two to four weeks old though, babies should start to develop routines. But you may not be able to get them on a really good sleep schedule until they're two to three months old. That's when they are finishing up a big growth spurt, and their eating and sleeping patterns start to stabilize. They're eating on a more consistent and predictable basis, so they sleep a little better.

The best thing that new parents can do to help babies figure out daytime versus nighttime is to keep everything bright and stimulating and don't insist on everyone being super quiet during the day, and at night keep the lights dim, make all your interactions with your baby as boring as possible and just try to keep everything calm.

Parents should put their babies to bed drowsy but still awake so the baby learns to fall asleep in their own space, and be sure they're on their backs and there's nothing in there bassinet or crib that could suffocate them. I've found sleep sacks were great. They kept my winter babies cozy but let their arms stick out because they hated being swaddled, and then there was nothing else in their bassinet except them. No pillows, no blankets, no stuffed animals, nada. A lot of sleep issues with kids start as they get older. So if you can help your baby establish good sleep habits from a young age, it can prevent a lot of problems later on when they become toddlers.

If your baby has a lot of difficulty with getting on a good sleep schedule, talk to your baby's pediatrician so they can get a better history of what's going on and give you some guidance so you all sleep better.

Announcer: Have a question about a medical procedure? Want to learn more about a health condition? With over 2,000 interviews with our physicians and specialists, there's a pretty good chance you'll find what you want to know. Check it out at thescoperadio.com.

Interviewer: Food poisoning. How long after you eat it will it take to affect you? You're at a barbecue or a party or something and you ate a little something and now you're kind of wondering, "Oh, man. Maybe that chip dip was out a little too long." You're worried that you're going to get food poisoning. How long is it going to take until you actually know whether or not you did?

Dr. Troy Madsen is an emergency room physician at University of Utah Health. Food poisoning. How long after you eat something will it take to affect you?

Dr. Madsen: So food poisoning's going to take about six hours to hit you. And when I tell you this, I'm speaking from personal experience because I had some really bad potato salad once, that I knew was bad, and I still ate it and six hours later, I was as sick as I've ever been.

Interviewer: And what are those symptoms?

Dr. Madsen: So, typically, you're going to get some nausea, vomiting, maybe you get some diarrhea as well. Abdominal cramping, you might hurt all over, you might have a headache with it as well, but, typically, it's going to be those stomach, those GI symptoms. Just lots and lots of vomiting as your body is reacting to that bacteria that are in the food that made you sick.

Interviewer: So about six hours, normally. Does it vary from bacteria to bacteria?

Dr. Madsen: It does, but the most common one we see is Staph aureus, which affects thing like potato salad, mayonnaise-based sorts of foods. And that's usually what we're seeing, where you're at a barbecue, you're at a dinner, these things are left out too long, someone brought it from home and forgot it in their car and then goes out and gets it, you know. All these kinds of bad scenarios that are setting it up to really start to grow bacteria in there. And so, most of the time, it's six hours.

Interviewer: All right and how . . . does it automatically cause symptoms if you eat something that could be potentially bad, or do some people just react differently?

Dr. Madsen: I think some people it just depends, maybe . . . I don't know. You know, like I said, I had a personal experience with it and I knew this was not great potato salad, but I'm like, "I've got a strong stomach."

Interviewer: I guess you didn't, huh?

Dr. Madsen: I guess not. So I don't know if there's just, like, a certain threshold where if you eat X amount, you will get sick. If you eat less than that, you won't get sick. It's either really bad or it's not bad at all. Seems like most cases we see are people who come in who are feeling really sick from this.

Interviewer: Sure, which would make sense if they're coming into the emergency room, I suppose. So if some sort of food poisoning, or something I believe to be food poisoning, hits, you know, it's the six hours later after I ate something, maybe it was even at a restaurant, should I automatically be worried, or will my body kind of take care of it?

Dr. Madsen: Your body should take care of it. You know, if you've got other illnesses like kidney disease, heart problems, issues with dehydration, then I'd be more concerned because you're going to lose a lot of fluid. But if you're otherwise healthy and you think you can get through it, it's probably going to last six to 12 hours, and then you should feel better. You may want to go to the ER if you need to get some fluids, need to get some medication for nausea and vomiting, just to get through it. But the reality is most people are going to get through it okay. They're going to feel pretty crummy, but come out of it feeling weak, but feeling all right after 12 hours.

Interviewer: Would an urgent care be able to help you with those things, an IV and medication?

Dr. Madsen: They might be able to. The problem is if you go in an urgent care and you're just vomiting a lot, they might just get concerned enough, they might just send you straight to the ER. So it's kind of a tough call. Your doctor also might be able to call in a medication for you, some nausea medication, and maybe someone could pick it up for you. Because if you could just get that stuff in your system, you should be able to get through it okay.

Interviewer: Got you. And other than my own personal health, could it be something else that's more insidious than just food poisoning that would cause concern? I suppose if it doesn't stop in 12 hours, that's when . . .

Dr. Madsen: Yeah. It absolutely could, and that's the tough thing with food poisoning. We have people come in all the time that say, "I've got food poisoning," and honestly, I have no way to know unless they tell me, "Yeah, this other person was there and they got sick too and ate the same thing." Could be a virus, could be appendicitis, could be a bowel obstruction. There are lots of things that go through my mind so, definitely, if you're not feeling better after even six hours, you may consider getting checked out. And if you're having lots of abdominal pain, bloating in your abdomen, like your abdomen just feels like it's really distended, like it's sticking out, or you're really tender in the right, lower side of your abdomen, those are all things that might suggest something else going on.

updated: December 26, 2022
originally published: February 3, 2017

Interviewer: It's New Years. A lot of people make New Years resolutions. My New Years resolution this year was just live healthier, and I'm here with Dr. Tom Miller from University of Utah Hospital. As I started thinking about that simple statement I thought well, "What does live healthier mean?" So, I thought I'd ask you.

Dr. Miller: I think it's pretty straightforward:

1. Don't smoke.
2. Don't drink. Or if you drink, drink just a little.
3. Get plenty of exercise. Eat right and manage your weight.

Interviewer: All right. Do you feel that get plenty of exercise and eat right are self explanatory in your experience?

Dr. Miller: I think most people understand that. I think we all should be eating less protein, less meat and eating more vegetables.

Interviewer: So, you've basically boiled it down to three things.

Dr. Miller: Yeah, three things: Don't smoke. Don't drink. And if you drink, just drink a very little bit, that's less than an ounce of pure alcohol a day. Workout an hour a day and maintain your weight. That is, keep a body mass index between 18.5 and 25.

updated: January 5, 2022
originally published: December 30, 2014