As I said before, I'm a fellow traveler and not a scientist. What I suggest in this post is what I've learned as a consumer. I provide references to more information at the end of the chapter in case you want to study this more on your own. I'll leave the scientific detail to the scientists.
Though nutrigenomics is a long word, its actually short for nutritional genomics. It's the study of interactions between genes, the environment, and nutrition. We've been taught in the past that the genes were born with determine our future. Nutrigenomics has been proving that we can influence our future health by making smart choices when we decide what we eat, our daily exercise activities, and create our environment. It's actually changing the field of nutrition in terms of understanding how to preserve our health.
You may have noticed some people who can eat what are considered unhealthy foods, smoke for years, drink, and remain healthy without much exercise. Other people are more sensitive and suffer almost immediate results if they don't pay attention to their food and exercise choices. Science suggests the difference may have something to do with a persons genotype.
Nutrigenomics seeks to help people understand their genetic predisposition for disease and other factors, and provide a personalized diet and exercise program designed to help the person minimize genetic expression of the problem genes, and maximize a body's ability to stay ahead of the natural progression of genetic-related diseases.
A Duke University study in 2000 found that the right diet can even have a genetic effect on offspring. When they changed the mothers diet just before conception using a particular diet to address her genetic predisposition to disease, they could turn off the problem gene so that her children did not inherit their mothers genetic problem. To me this is an amazing link between diet and genetic modification, giving us as consumers the potential to make real changes in what we may have thought was our inevitable destiny.
Our children are especially at risk. In February 2007 the Stanford Prevention Research Center studied the effects of our children's lack of physical activity in our current culture. Among their findings, Obese children and adolescents carry significant health risks such as hypertension, high cholesterol, glucose intolerance/insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, sleep apnea, menstrual abnormalities, impaired balance, and orthopedic problems. Obese children and adolescents are also more likely to suffer from depression or low self-esteem and to feel discriminated against. Obese children and adolescents often become overweight adults, and thus are more likely to suffer from chronic conditions such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, asthma, and even cancer. Childhood obesity is predictive of increased medical expenses, decreased quality of life, lost work time, physical and mental disabilities, premature death, and loss of productivity.
Though they say much more research is needed, they also state ... there is an urgent need for action. We cannot afford, nor can our children afford, to wait until all of our questions are answered before taking action. Lack of physical activity among children certainly plays a significant role in the childhood obesity epidemic.
Best wishes,
Marilyn McLeod
Marilyn@PersonalizedHealthCoach.com
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