DGMC nutrition team preps for health month

  • Published
  • By 1st Lt. Sarah Fitch
  • 60th Diagnostics and Therapeutics Squadron
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  It is a fact that two-thirds of U.S. adults and nearly one-third of U.S. children and adolescents are obese or overweight.

According to the Journal of Obesity, almost 50 percent of women and 30 percent of men diet every year, spending more than $40 billion on weight-loss programs and products.

Despite their best efforts, the majority of those who lose weight in the short term end up regaining the weight within three to five years. It is clear that fad diets and products are not the answer.

If you are like the majority, you may have started off 2013 with a resolution for improved health by dieting, losing weight or setting new fitness goals. Hopefully you are still on track for meeting those aspirations, but if you need some additional motivation and information, the experts at David Grant USAF Medical Center and the Travis Health and Wellness Center are ready to help.

Diet is actually the Greek word for "way of life," which is exactly what we are focusing on this month. The key to health is to develop habits you can live with and stick to every day. Save your money, ditch the fad diets and join the DGMC nutrition team in making permanent changes to your health and celebrate the 40th anniversary of National Nutrition Month with the theme "Eat Right, Your Way, Every Day."

Registered dietitians and diet technicians at DGMC are thrilled to share some great tips, delicious food and fun activities with the base community throughout the month of March.

"Informed food choices are so important now, more than ever, because of our national obesity crisis and the fiscal burden it has placed upon our medical system," said Lt. Col. Danelle Roddy, 60th Diagnostics and Therapeutics Squadron nutritional medicine flight commander. "Our goal is to set the Travis community up for success to be happy and healthy in 2013 and for many years to come."

Stop by DGMC to find the nutritional medicine flight providing information and education from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. every Monday in the dining hall throughout March. Headed by the Outpatient Nutrition clinic, they will promote Meatless Mondays, the Color Challenge and Go for Green.

Meatless Monday is a campaign that promotes cutting meat out of your diet for one day per week and to focus on eating a more plant-based diet.

The Color Challenge encourages a healthy diet providing a multitude of fruits and vegetables from every color group each and every day.

"It gives us a great reason to display how amazing colorful, nutritious food can taste," said Maj. Amanda Sager, 60th MDTS chief of performance nutrition operations.

Go for Green is a traffic-light based nutrition labeling program that DGMC has adopted to make choosing healthy foods easier. Healthy options are labeled green while those that should be consumed in limited quantities will be labeled red.

Considering the rise in childhood obesity throughout the years, children need to be educated on making good food choices in a fun and engaging way. The nutrition team will do an outreach at each of the Child Development Centers during the last three weeks of March. DGMC dietitians and technicians are excited to involve the kids in coloring activities and providing them with healthy goodies and handouts to take home and share with their parents. It's never too early to start developing sound eating habits for the rest of their lives.

Another outreach effort will focus on food purchasing, since grocery shopping can be stressful and confusing. With 20 options for every food item, how is anyone supposed to know whether the sugar-free, fat-free, gluten-free or salt-free version is the best one to buy? Now is the time to get those questions answered about what you should really be putting in your grocery cart.

From 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. March 23, join Lisa Webster, Health and Wellness Center registered dietitian, who will bring her years of experience as a community dietitian to the Travis Commissary to answer those questions and educate at the event titled "The Amazing Power of Produce."

After all of this, if you're not sold on making positive healthy diet changes and are still filling your cart with pills, powders and other dietary supplements, join registered dietitian 1st Lt. Denise Campbell March 22 at the Outpatient Nutrition Clinic at DGMC for a presentation on performance enhancement supplements. Campbell gained amazing insight and drastically expanded her knowledge of dietary supplements while recently deployed and feels this is an important topic to discuss whether overseas or at home station.

Travis is fortunate to have nine registered dietitians and 28 diet technicians that are here for you and here to help. Join the DGMC nutrition team in celebrating National Nutrition Month 2013 at our various events to make this year a success.

For more information about any of our programs or classes offered, contact DGMC's outpatient nutrition clinic at 423-7867.