the health benefits of weight loss

Losing weight can improve your health in many ways:

• Reduction in blood pressure • Reduction in cholesterol (lipids) • Reduce your risk of obesity-related cancers • Reduce your risk of developing type 2 diabetes • Improve your life expectancy

Safe and healthy weight loss A safe and reasonable weekly weight loss is 0.5-1 kg (1-2 lbs). Losing too much weight quickly isn’t good for health and may lead to a quick regain of your loss.

Lose weight fast? If a diet is claiming that you can lose weight more rapidly, it is worth remembering that a normal person can only metabolise (burn off) around 1-2lbs of fat per week. If you lose more than this it may be a loss of lean tissue and fluid. We only want you to lose fat. When you stop a crash diet your body attempts to go back to its previous weight by making you really hungry. This is why people may do well initially on a crash diet, but when it stops they put the weight back on - plus some. Waist measurement A helpful way to check your progress is to measure your waist. Excess weight stored around your stomach is the greatest risk to health. More information about waist measurements:

www.nhs.uk/chq/Pages/849. aspx?CategoryID=5

How motivated are you? Losing weight can be hard because it may mean changing comfortable but unhelpful habits. What does this mean for you? Are you ready to face the challenge?

http://www.weightconcern.org.uk/ sites/default/files/Worksheet%20 node71%20Facing%20the%20 challenges%20V2.pdf

Link provided with the kind permission of Weight Concern (University College London 2016).