Nutrition and Lifestyle Management
As a part of its online Healthcare and Wellness Expo, World Trade Center Mumbai organised an interactive webinar on ‘Nutrition and Lifestyle Management’
Highlighting the novel therapeutic interventions for obesity and Alzheimer’s, Dr Satya Prakash, Professor - Department of Biomedical Engineering, Mcgill University, Montreal Quebec, Canada said, 1.9 billion adults worldwide suffer from obesity. This figure has doubled or even tripled in many countries over the past 30 years. Two-thirds of the US adult population is overweight and a half is obese, incurring costs of about USD 190 billion in the US alone.
Dr. Prakash emphasised the health risks associated with obesity include cardiovascular disease which is a leading cause of death, hypertension, diabetes, osteoarthritis and cancer, causing 2.8 million deaths a year. The current approaches to treat obesity include lifestyle modifications, gastric bypass and prescription weight loss. However, these strategies have been generally unsuccessful and obesity rates continue to increase. Further, many people regain their lost weight, and these treatments are expensive and highly invasive, and many a times, have side effects.
Dr. Prakash suggested that to treat obesity, the therapeutic targets include adipogenesis and microbiome. Obesity alters the microbiome composition. Diet alters microbial ecology. He explained the roles of probiotics and prebiotics in addressing obesity. Probiotic supplementation attenuates increases in body mass.
He also discussed about Alzheimer disease, and suggested that by understanding how microbiome/probiotics affect metabolic signalling, inflammation, oxidative stress and neurological signalling, a microbiome formulation may be designed that prevents and/or treats the onset and/or progression of Alzheimer’s.
He said, re-establishing a healthy microbiome is a promising avenue for treatment of obesity, Alzheimer’s, diabetes and for enhancement of human longevity.
Ms. Kanchan Patwardhan, Founder, Kanchan’s House of Health and Nutrition said, to keep our metabolism high, we should eat protein-rich food, legumes, pulses, nuts and oilseeds, among other foods, and if our gut is healthy, these foods will get digested easily. She further added, our diet should also include complex carbohydrates such as brown rice, wheat, quinoa, and millets such as jowar, bajra and ragi.
Speaking on the occasion, Dr Shilpa Desai, Founder, C4 Integrated Wellness Pvt. Ltd., warned that Covid has proven that we should be conscious of our eating habits. Without getting anxious about the future, we should manage our immediate surroundings, and understand that prevention is better than cure.
Mr. Abhishek Bachhawat, Managing Director, Aarohie Nutri Food Pvt. Ltd., presented a Case Study on his organisation’s success in exporting organic foods. He explained that organic products have huge international demand, however they are perishable and have a lower shelf-life. His company, therefore, dries herbs such as tulsi, ashvagandha and giloi, and supplies to tea makers and other manufacturers for further processing.
Mr. Bachhawat expressed that his company also exports essential oils, and his products are USFDA and EU-certified. The company endeavors to re-skill farmers and cut down on middlemen. He concluded by expressing that organic spices, herbs and nutraceuticals have huge export potential due to their inherent qualities of improving health.
The programme was attended by exhibitors and participants of the Healthcare and Wellness Expo.