KIN 122 Podcast

In this podcast episode, the host and three guests discuss the topic of obesity and its effects on health. They define obesity as having a BMI equal to or greater than 30, but also acknowledge that BMI may not be the most accurate measure of health due to factors like muscle mass. They discuss alternative ways to measure health and fitness, such as body composition analysis using DEXA scans or bioelectrical impedance analysis tests. The prevalence of obesity in the US is high, with about 41.9% of Americans being obese, and higher rates in certain racial and ethnic groups. They also talk about the impact of factors like access to healthy food options, the rise of fast food restaurants, and sedentary lifestyles on obesity rates. Lack of physical activity is a major issue, with many adults and high school students not getting enough aerobic exercise. They emphasize the importance of diet, exercise, and lifestyle changes in preventing and managing obesity. Hello everybody, welcome to Health Hacks, the podcast where we give you guys all the hacks in order to live a healthier, happier, more satisfied life. This is Olivia Lira-Crane. I currently have a major in kinesiology with a minor in nutrition, along with my graduate degree in health sciences, all from the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign, and I'm your host today. On this lovely evening, I am joined with three very intellectual individuals. Can you guys introduce yourselves for everyone? Yeah. Hi, my name is Noah Beltran, and I've done a ton of research on the literature of the prevalence of obesity at Oxford University. Hi, thank you so much for having me. My name is Elpidia Tan, I'm currently a professor at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and I have been focusing on sports medicine and physical activity. Hello, my name is Alexia Ortiz, I'm from Chicago and have been researching at Loyola University to find a relationship of how being alone in the neighborhood increases the risk of obesity. Thank you guys so much for being here with me today, I am super excited to get started. On today's episode of Health Hacks, we will be discussing the topic of obesity and the effects of physical activity. To begin, let's define obesity. So, obesity is specifically defined as someone with a BMI equal to or greater than 30 kilograms per meter squared. Does anyone have any pushback or further explanations of this? Yeah, so since BMI is a body composition estimate that is measured in the weight-to-height ratio, one can actually have more muscle, which can increase their weight, affecting their height-to-weight ratio, which changes their BMI. I agree with you, Noah. I think it's important to take into consideration each individual person. We can't say that a 6'5", 300-pound linebacker is unhealthy because of his BMI, it's 34.7. We have to account for his muscles. Ah, okay. That doesn't make sense, since BMI is described as the ratio of height to weight, and muscle is heavier than fat, so someone with more muscle may be considered obese or unhealthy through the BMI scale, when in fact they're really not. So, what are some more accurate ways to measure health and fitness? A really effective and important way to measure health and fitness is through your body composition. Body composition is the percentages of fat, bone, and muscle in human bodies. It is important for humans to keep a balanced body composition so they may be able to perform daily activities of living comfortably and to be healthy. Okay, so body composition is the proportions of lean mass and fat mass, and it differs across every single person. But how exactly can we measure that? So, the gold standard of measuring body composition is through a DEXA scan. A DEXA scan uses x-rays in order to measure bone density and also muscle and fat mass. However, a DEXA scan is quite expensive and may not be accessible to everyone. A cheaper alternative is using a bioelectrical impedance analysis test. This sends a small electrical current into your body and measures fat mass and fat pre-mass. Okay, cool. I knew about the DEXA scan, but I didn't know it was that expensive. Yeah, so a DEXA scan is roughly between $150 and $300 for a single scan. But someone could buy a bioelectrical impedance analysis test, such as a SmartScale, for as little as $30, and they can also use this over a long period of time. It is not just a one-time use. Oh, that's cool. Although it isn't the most accurate way to measure, it's definitely a start to find out how much fat and lean mass the person has if they were to start losing weight or if they want to, like, build their muscle mass. Oh, yeah, I actually have one of those scales at home. I should probably try it out. So how prevalent is obesity in the U.S.? And are there any areas with higher rates compared to others? Yeah, so obesity is definitely a huge problem right now. According to the CDC, about 41.9% of Americans are obese. And from 1999 to 2020, obesity actually increased from 30.5% to 41.9%. And additionally, we could also see that the southern states have a higher prevalence of obesity. Also, child obesity is a huge problem. For children ages 2 through 19, in 2017 to 2020, the prevalence of obesity was about 19.7%, or about 14.7 million children and adolescents. When we look at the trends as children age, the obesity rate increases. This is something we should obviously look out for, for the younger generation. Yeah, and with obesity, people are much more susceptible to chronic health conditions, such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and certain types of cancers. A study from the Journal of the American Heart Association, published in February of 2021, states that obesity was linked to 30% to 53% of new type 2 diabetes diagnosis each year over the past two decades. Through this study, we can clearly see that as the percentage of Americans with obesity increases, more of these diseases will also increase. Ah, I see. That is definitely important for people to understand in regards to their own health. So, why is it that people become obese in the first place? And why does this vary across different locations and races in the U.S.? Yeah, to start off, certain races have higher prevalences of obesity. According to the CDC, black adults have the highest prevalence at about 49.9%, followed by Hispanic adults with 45.6%, and Asian adults at the bottom with 16.1%. Yeah, so I don't know why people tend to become obese in the first place because of the communities that they're in. A lot of the neighborhoods, for example, tend to have things like grocery stores. In Jennifer Elflack's journal article, she states, residents in low SES urban neighborhoods may also be more reliant on convenience stores, bodegas, or small local vendors. Frosty foods are more difficult to find, more expensive, or may be of lower quality than in large retail stores. Since these stores are the only ones available, it makes it difficult to maintain a healthy diet when only some are available at Frosty Foods. And I can relate to that because growing up in Chicago, this was very prevalent on the southwest side, where there weren't any grocery stores available in low SES neighborhoods because most of them shut down, leaving residents who did travel to the nearest Walmart or rely on junk food from the nearest gas station. That makes a lot of sense. People that don't have the resources or access to good diets will definitely be more susceptible to poor dieting, leading to obesity. This goes to the general public's education on obesity as well. Those who don't get educated on the dangers of obesity will be more susceptible to its risks. That's part of the reason why we're talking here today. Yeah, I just wanted to add to Alexia's point. The rise of fast food restaurants has definitely affected obesity greatly. According to Jennifer Block's journal article, Neighborhoods and Obesity, between 1991 and 2001, fast food outlets in the United States rose from about 30,000 to 220,000. An additional national survey of Americans lasting two days showed that more than a quarter of participants consumed fast food on at least one of those two days surveyed. From the literature, it's conclusive that those who consumed fast food had significantly higher intakes of calories, lower intakes of nutrients, and higher BMI scores than those who ate no fast food. Wow, yeah. Capitalism in its finest, huh? We know that fast food is not the best option when it comes to nutritional value, but it's not only people's diets that can affect their health. It's also the influx of sedentary lifestyle. Yeah, obviously there's a huge lack of physical activity. The CDC says about one in two adults don't get enough aerobic physical activity, and we talk about high school students. Seventy-seven percent of high school students don't get enough aerobic physical activity. In addition, about $117 billion is spent on annual health care costs related to low physical activity. From this statistic, we can see that many individuals aren't getting as active as they should. Obviously, some are at a disadvantage when it comes to accessing physical activity. Many people live in neighborhoods with poor sidewalks and street infrastructure. In addition, many of those don't have access to parks in their communities. On top of that, those in low-income neighborhoods fear going outside due to gun violence. Yeah, so there are a lot of factors that we need to take into consideration. Luckily, as we talked about diets earlier, diets for the most part are modifiable, and people can change their behavior in order to avoid becoming obese. However, there are also a lot of non-modifiable factors that can affect a person's susceptibility to obesity. Some of these factors include gender, race, age, socioeconomic status, the environment one's in, and their genetics. With non-modifiable factors, such as genetics, people can't do much in order to stop obesity from occurring in their lives. Right. Although someone can't control the influx of obesity in their lives, they can do things to prevent obesity or reduce the impacts of obesity. Some methods include maintaining a good diet, getting good sleep, not leading a sedentary lifestyle, but most importantly, taking part in regular exercise. I'm sure you guys can attest to this. Yeah, I can attest to that. There has been a lot of research on how physical activity can prevent obesity. A Harvard article review I found shows that researchers say that physical activity increases people's total energy expenditure, which can help them stay in a calorie maintenance or deficit. Physical activity can also decrease fat around the waist and total body fat. Additionally, strength training like push-ups and weight training helps build muscle mass, which increases the energy that the body burns throughout the day. Yeah, a way to start including physical activity if you're currently living a sedentary lifestyle is by slowly making changes into your lifestyle, like walking to places instead of taking the bus, taking time to stretch if you have a sedentary job, replacing sedentary activities like watching TV to instead taking the jog around the block, you know, like running or like, I don't know, pool hooping if you want. Then from there, start including more time for stretching. Yeah, so I think it is very important to start slow if you're starting from a consistently sedentary lifestyle. Eventually, though, you should definitely increase the intensity of your exercises. The American College of Sports Medicine and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that adults should participate in 150 minutes of moderate intensity aerobic activity each week. Alongside aerobic activity, the ACSM and CDC also recommend that adults should implement weight training for each major muscle group two or more times a week. There are many ways that everyday people can start including physical activity into their lives. There are a lot of different ways that this is possible. What are some of your guys' favorite ways to stay active? Yeah, I love this question. Some things I try to do is lift weights at least four days a week and try to get some cardio three days a week for about 15 minutes. Exercise has really benefited my mental health and the stresses I have doing my research. Oh, that's really cool. So with your lifts, do you focus on specific muscle groups or do you do full body strengthening? Yeah, so I try to do a push-pull split. I try to hit each muscle group at least once every week. I also do some moderate intensity cardio through jogging and incline walking. Also, I do ice baths for recovery three times a week. Nice. So I also like to lift. However, my favorite is playing sports like basketball or volleyball. Oh, wow. I used to play volleyball. Volleyball is so much fun and I was probably in the best shape of my life when I played it. Yeah, well, volleyball is a really cool sport. For me, sports is a great way of exercising because it works on a lot of aspects of your body such as coordination, muscle use, but most importantly, cardio because I hate doing it. However, when it is in a sports setting, I don't mind it at all. On top of that, sports for me is my favorite way of exercising because it implements all the things I mentioned before, but also adds a competitive and team-playing aspect in order to win, which makes exercising even more enjoyable. That's super cool. I love that for you. What about you, Alexia? For me, my favorite way to be active is by walking everywhere instead of taking the bus. Also, the buses are packed most of the time, so I just walk it. Also, I swim twice a week for an hour to include more physical activity since it uses the majority of my swim. That's really great. For me personally, I try to implement as much lifestyle and physical activity as I can by walking to close places or taking the stairs if I can. I go on walks at least four days a week. And, well, it looks like we're running out of time here, so that will conclude our episode for Health Hacks for Today. Please remember to implement physical activity into your life for its multitude of health benefits. Thank you guys so much for joining me today, and I will see you on the next episode of Health Hacks. Yeah, thank you for having me, Olivia. Yes, thank you. It was a lot of fun. Yeah, thank you. We'll see you next week.