Lose Weight-Tone Abs With Electronic Muscle Stimulator? Can Body Fat

Lose Weight-Tone Abs With Electronic Muscle Stimulator? Can Body Fat Melt Away?

You have probably seen plenty of advertisements extolling how Electronic Abdominal Stimulators can melt your belly fat fast and quickly. Most of these advertisements will also claim that their electronic abs stimulators can also flatten your tummy to reveal your six pack abs muscle. They even claim that by using electronic abs stimulators for X minutes is better that 300 sit ups or crunches, so you can say bye bye to diets and exercise forever. Too good to be true?

On the other hand, you may also have come across many articles and messages from the health and fitness industry or from your fitness personal trainers who refute the advertisers claiming that the only way to get a flat tummy with well defined six pack abs muscle is through healthy eating and exercise. Now that is hard work isnt it? So you will rather take a chance with an electronic abs stimulator wont you?

So who is telling the truth? Ok, instead of joining in the controversy, this article points out what the authorities such as U.S. Food and Drug Administration has got to say. Below is an excerpt from U.S. Food and Drug Administration, FDA Consumer magazine July-August 2002. You can read the full report at http://www.fda.gov/fdac/features/2002/402_abs.html :-

In May, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed complaints against three manufacturers of these devices, alleging that they have made false claims in their advertising, seen in heavily aired infomercials on national cable television, shorter television commercials, and ads in the print media.

The unfounded claims cited by the FTC include the promise of “six pack” or “washboard” abs without exercise, claims that the devices will give users a trimmer waist or cause fat loss, and that use of the device is equivalent to (or better than) regular abdominal exercises, such as sit-ups or crunches. The FTC complaints also allege that the advertising claimed falsely that the stimulators are safe for all to use, and did not disclose adequately the possible health hazards for some people.

Q. Why does the FDA regulate electrical muscle stimulators?

A. Electrical muscle stimulators are considered medical devices under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. Under this law and the agency’s regulations, the FDA is responsible for regulating the sale of all electrical muscle stimulators in the United States. Therefore, firms must comply with appropriate FDA premarket regulatory requirements before they can legally sell their stimulators. Most electrical muscle stimulators (EMS devices) that have been reviewed by the FDA are intended for use in physical therapy and rehabilitation under the direction of a health-care professional. If a company wants to sell EMS devices directly to consumers, the company needs to show the FDA that the device can be used safely and effectively in that setting.

Q. These electrical muscle stimulators are advertised not only to tone, firm, and strengthen abdominal muscles, but also to provide weight loss, girth reduction, and “rock hard” abs. Do they really work?

A. While an EMS device may be able to temporarily strengthen, tone or firm a muscle, no EMS devices have been cleared at this time for weight loss, girth reduction, or for obtaining “rock hard” abs.

Q. Is the FDA concerned about the unregulated marketing of these devices?

A. Yes. The FDA has received reports of shocks, burns, bruising, skin irritation, and pain associated with the use of some of these devices. There have been a few recent reports of interference with implanted devices such as pacemakers and defibrillators. Some injuries required hospital treatment. The FDA is also concerned because many of these devices have cables and leads. If those cables and leads do not comply with electrical safety standards, there is the possibility that users and other household members could be electrocuted. The FDA is currently investigating firms that are illegally marketing EMS devices.

Q. What does FDA regulation accomplish?

A. Before they may legally sell their devices, firms that market EMS devices must be able to demonstrate that these products are as safe and as effective as similar devices that are legally marketed. Devices may be marketed only for uses that are established for the device or for uses that the firm can support with data. At this time, the FDA is not aware of scientific information to support many of the promotional claims being made for numerous devices being widely promoted on television, infomercials, newspapers, and magazines.

Q. Does that mean that it’s unsafe to use an electrical muscle stimulator that has not met FDA requirements?

A. Using a product that has not met FDA requirements isn’t necessarily unsafe or dangerous. But it could be. Unregulated devices also may have safety problems associated with cables and leads that can lead to accidental shock and electrocution of users and other household members, including children.

Q. If I use an electrical muscle stimulator, will it give me the same kind of effect that lots of sit-ups, stomach crunches and other abdominal exercises will?

A. Using these devices alone will not give you “six-pack” abs. Applying electrical current to muscles may cause them to contract. Stimulating muscles repeatedly with electricity may eventually result in muscles that are strengthened and toned to some extent but will not, based on currently available data, create a major change in your appearance without the addition of weight loss and regular exercise.

Now, who is telling the truth about electronic muscle stimulator being able to melt tummy fat and reveal your six pack abs? Well, you be the judge and come to your own verdict.

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Lose Weight With Living Foods

Losing weight doesn’t have to be boring when you focus on living foods. What does this mean? Simply by making sure your plate reflects a range of colours, you’ll naturally create more balanced and healthful menus complete with a range of living foods.

What are living foods? They are re live, colourful, fresh and raw – fruits, vegetables and salads!

Let’s Look At The Positives

1. Colourful foods have no preservatives and no added colour!

2. Provide an abundance of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, fibre, water and trace elements.

3. Have a high water content – an excellent source of hydration for the body.

4. Are visually appetising.

5. Their firm textures demand a good chew, so we eat them more slowly and feel full afterwards.

6. Are quickly and easily processed and assimilated by the body – less work for the digestive system.

7. Are safer – contain less undesirable man-made chemicals.

8. Are as nature intended (unlike processed, pre-packaged modern fast foods!)

9. Are pure energy – living food.

Consuming Cooked Foods

1. Heat destroys the vitalising nutrients in colourful foods. So much so that sometimes, you may as well be eating cardboard for all the good it does your body!

2. The effectiveness of fibre in cooked fresh foods is reduced – vegetables that are floppy and overcooked pass through the body with a reduced ‘cleansing’ action.

3. If you cook vegetables, always steam them lightly and aim to retain their ‘crunch’!

4. Cooked vegetables tend to turn out soft and therefore require less chewing, which means they are usually eaten more quickly, so are less satisfying.

5. Heat also destroys the enzymes in fresh foods, which are essential for digestion. This means the body has to tap into its own precious supply of enzymes to support the digestive process.

6. Heat also destroys the enzymes in fresh foods, which are essential for digestion. This means the body has to tap into its own precious supply of enzymes to support the digestive process.

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Getting Yourself Fit For The Season

With the changing of the seasons comes the changing of the wardrobe. Sometimes, however, you find that you can’t fit into your clothes the way you could a year ago. A recent survey shows that two in five adults need to lose at least 10 pounds to feel comfortable in a bathing suit. That’s why so many people are choosing this time to start a diet.

If you’re beginning a weight loss program to get your body ready for the season, here are some tips to help you get started:

• Challenge Yourself. Have a goal and stick to achieving it. Make sure that you are reminded of your goal every day.

• Set a Date. Starting your weight loss plan early gives you plenty of time to shed those unwanted pounds. Choose a weight loss program that is easy to follow, fits into your lifestyle and produces quick results.

• Get a Buddy. Enlist the support of a friend to help you meet your weight loss goals. Studies show those people who have the support of a buddy tend to stick to their diets more than those who fly solo.

• The Garden of “Eatin’.” Eat more fruits and vegetables. Not only are these foods good for your waistline, but they are nutritious and keep you hydrated.

• Put Some Spring in Your Step. Whether it means parking your car farther away than usual or taking a pet to the park, try to make exercise part of your daily routine. Even 20 minutes a day adds up.

• Spring Fling. Host a dinner party for your friends and make sure that there are plenty of healthy food options available. Try grilling lean proteins such as chicken and tuna instead of frying or baking them. You can add a variety of seasonings and spices to change up the routine.

• Space it Out. Studies show that eating smaller meals throughout the day can be effective in the weight loss process because they help to curb your hunger. If you eat six small meals a day, you will feel less hungry in between meals. Plan your meals in advance to avoid last-minute splurges.

• Drink Up. If you participate in outdoor activities, remember to stay hydrated. Steer clear of calorie-laden beverages such as soda, lemonade and sweet tea. Water is always the best choice.

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Lose Weight by Eating Breakfast and Drinking Milk

Did you know that dieting and weight loss are two of the most common resolutions or goals by many people but usually results to failure? Dont give up yet. Stay committed and read through.

If you really want to lose weight, forget the fad diets and eat breakfast and drink milk. Starting each day with milk and cereal may be the success for achieving a healthy weight.

Many people don’t realize to eat breakfast but to skip entire morning tastes, either because youre in rush or lazy, or just want to reduce weight. Considerable number of people finish with a soft drink or a cup of coffee as their morning meal. Chances are this is going to have an opposite effect on you because skipping meals almost always leads to overeating at lunchtime. This is especially true with breakfast, because you’ve just been asleep for 7 or 8 hours and your body needs to recover from this brief period of starvation.

Studies show that people who regularly eat breakfast, particularly cereal with low fat or fat-free milk, tend to be leaner compared to those who skip the morning meal or eat other options. Also, breakfast eaters are more likely to have long-term success in maintaining a reasonable weight. There is a finding that a cereal and milk breakfast is a habit common to successful weight loss maintainers.

Combine that with studies drinking 24 ounces of milk a day with healthy weight loss, and you’ve got a strategy that may lead to lost pounds. Multiple studies have shown that people who drink milk and get adequate amounts of calcium in their diets tend to weigh less than their peers who don’t drink milk. A diet deficient in calcium has a higher risk for being overweight.

Weight Control by Eating Eggs

Eating eggs for breakfast can reduce hunger and caloric intake by more than 400 calories, both at lunchtime and over the next 24 hours. As a result, eggs are useful in helping overweight people reduce their energy intakes, a prerequisite of losing weight. This is great news if youre trying to lose weight as it means you may find it easier to cut calories without feeling hungry. In fact, you could expect to lose up to 2lb. a month, simply by eating eggs for breakfast!

Eggs are packed with various nutrients but contain just 85 calories each. Theres also no limit to the number of eggs you can eat in a week contrary to popular belief.

Other studies found that protein-based breakfasts improved weight loss better than carbohydrate-focused breakfasts. The better effects are increased when its combined with exercise.

Should I avoid eating certain foods for the sake of weight loss?

Forget about avoiding eating a certain food that you like to eat – that’s a dieters mentality and it doesn’t help you lose weight. It just makes you obsessed about food and eating. Instead, if you are really hungry, then eat, and stop as soon as youre satisfied. Just dont eat until youre totally full! So, if you’re hungry during breakfast, then eat. If you’re not hungry during lunch or dinner, then have a smaller meal.

Keep in mind that you should not eat too many sweet foods. No matter what time you eat sweets, if it’s more energy than your body can use, it will be stored, meaning excess kilos.

Fad diets wont work and only provide short-term results. Instead, always enjoy a wide variety of healthy foods and be physically active. Fad dieting is a hindrance that you don’t need in your life.

Things to Remember:

* Eating breakfast increases your metabolism and burns more kilojoules during the day, which can help you lose weight.

* Protein-based breakfasts improved weight loss better than carbohydrate-focused breakfasts.

* Eggs are great protein-rich breakfast, complete with zinc, iron and vitamins like A, B, D, E and B12. Long ago, people thought that eating many eggs contributed to health risks. This is not true and its already proven that they dont contribute to high cholesterol or heart disease.

* Dont be afraid to eat a reasonable portion of your favorite dessert or snack food every now and then.

* Try to eat steamed vegetables and drink soup in the morning. Did you know that this is common in Japan? It may take some time getting used to, but the benefits are: reduced fat and added nutrients from the vegetables.

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Lose Weight For A Healthier Heart

Obesity has reached epidemic proportions in the United States. According to the Centers for Disease

Control and Prevention, the number of obese Americans continues to rise. In fact, 30 percent of adults over age 20-more than 60 million people-are obese, which means they are 30 pounds overweight and have a BMI, or body mass index (a mea-sure of body fat), of more than 30.

Obesity Is On The Rise

One of the goals of the National Institutes of Health is to reduce obesity among adults by more than half by the year 2010. However, current data suggests that the situation is getting worse. Due to rising rates of childhood obesity, life expectancy for the average American could decrease by two to five years over the next few decades unless major efforts are made to slow down the rising rates of obesity.

What’s more, obesity is a risk factor for heart disease and other serious health complications:

• Obesity is a risk factor for type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. Having these disorders at the same time is a condition called the metabolic syndrome, which can lead to an increased risk for heart disease and kidney disease.

• High blood pressure, a risk factor for heart disease, is twice as common in obese adults than in those who are at a healthy weight.

• Obesity can also lead to arthritis, which is caused by stress on your joints.

A Likely Trigger For Heart Disease

Obesity, high cholesterol and high blood pressure are a common grouping of risk factors for people with heart disease. Managing all these risk factors will help reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke.

What You Can Do Today

Overweight and obesity together represent the number-two preventable cause of death in the U.S. after smoking. There are many things you can do to get your weight under control and to help manage your risk for heart disease:

• Develop a diet and exercise plan that you feel is realistic and that you can maintain.

• Talk to your doctor about medicines that may help control your risk factors for heart disease. If you are prescribed medicines, take them exactly as directed and for as long as your doctor recommends.

• Resolve to make this year a healthier one-set a weight-loss goal and stick with it.

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Lose Weight The Natural Way While You Sleep

You probably didn’t know it, but one of the best times to lose weight is while you sleep. That’s because the human body is designed by nature to repair itself during the hours we are sleeping.

Our bodies use sleep to repair and strengthen our muscles, joints and other parts that get tired and damaged through use and exertion during waking hours.

This restorative process uses energy to rebuild lean muscle mass and to help rebuild other kinds of body tissue. That is worth repeating — this rebuilding process uses energy — and if the rebuilding process is running smoothly and efficiently, that energy comes from places in our body where energy is stored — from fat.

In other words, the body rebuilds tissue, organs, bone, and lean muscle by burning fat.

Several things about this process are worth noting. They have an important bearing on how efficiently it works.

Collagen is very important to the body repair process

Collagen is the most common protein found in our bodies. It is the main component of our skin, nails, bones, cartilage, and connective tissue and is found in all of the body organs. Cartilage is the cushion and shock absorber between joints, and the reason we stay flexible and mobile. Healthy cartilage is constantly being regenerated by the body naturally and this process contributes to keeping us youthful and flexible.

As we age, our bodies lose the ability to produce collagen at sufficient levels needed to support the deep restorative sleep processes that our bodies are designed to perform. This can be a major contributor that leads to a premature aged appearance and can definitely affect our flexibility and mobility. It stands to reason that a collagen supplement combined with other natural ingredients can have a dramatic effect in better supporting the deep restorative sleep process. This in turn can allow the body to experience more energy, build more lean muscle, and burn more fat.

Amino acids enhance the regeneration process

The rebuilding process is also influenced by the efficiency of the amino acids normally used for this purpose. As part of the rebuilding process, amino acids help maintain lean muscle mass and allow the body to more readily consume fat for energy. This contributes to weight loss.

Again, as we age, our body’s production of efficient amino acids is reduced. A supplement such as L-Carnitine is a special amino acid that enhances the body’s normal function and helps your body convert excess fat into readily available fuel. During deep sleep, these special amino acids work like a natural “turbo charger” to help your body repair, preserve and build lean muscle while burning stored fat to supply the needed energy.

Not eating before sleeping is important

Since the body uses deep sleep for the restoration process, it is important when using a collagen supplement not to eat three hours before going asleep. This is because we don’t want nutrient competitiion between undigested food and the collagen supplement special nutrient formula itself. If the body has to concern itself with digestion it will not absorb the collagen formula properly. Therefore your body will not be performing its natural restorative process while you sleep, but rather will be concerned with undigested foods and will actually be storing fat from the continuing digestive process rather than burning fat as the energy for the deep sleep restorative process.

This tends to put us into a “diet circle of frustration”. The less time your body spends in deep restful sleep (without competing digestion), the less time it has to restore its natural health, and the less fat that is burned in support of this natural rebuilding process. Now we understand the key connection between deep restorative sleep and weight loss many times goes hand in hand with our overall health.

Reducing or eliminating the intake of food three hours before bedtime allows the body to use its natural fat reserves for metabolic fuel during the deep restorative sleep cycle.

Collagen weight loss program build on this process

A natural collagen product such as Lose and Snooze enables this natural process to once again help people lose weight. Lose and Snooze consists of a blend of Collagen, L-Carnitine and Aloe Barbadensis (Aloe Vera). The Collagen contributes to a more youthful appearance, greater flexibility, and all round mobility and strength.

In addition to all of this, most importantly, Collagen allows the deep sleep necessary to enable your body’s natural metabolic functions to occur, like when we were children. L-Carnitine promotes the burning of fat in support of the natural rebuilding, restorative process that occurs during deep sleep. The Aloe Barbadensis (Aloe Vera) contains numerous nutrients and amino acids that help create a healthy environment in support of your body’s own ability to create its own collagen, in addition to the remarkable Lose and Snooze formula itself.

Thousands of satisfied users of the collagen weight loss program have reported that using the liquid formula in combination with an empty stomach before bedtime, has been beneficial to their health and has helped them naturally lose weight.

And because the collagen weight loss program only helps lose excess fat (while rebuilding muscle), it can be used by anybody — not just people wanting to lose weight. It has also been beneficial to folks who want to enjoy better sleep, build lean muscle, improve their appearance and to reshape their body while maintaining their proper healthy weight.

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Lose Weight With A Healthy Diet

A healthy diet should include foods from the four main food groups. One of the best ways to lose weight is to follow the food pyramid and eat the suggested servings of each food group for your age. This method of healthy eating does require planning and you need to have a copy of the food pyramid in front of you as you plan your menu for the week. Planning a weekly menu is a good way to get started and once you do this for several weeks, the kinds and amounts of foods that you should be eating will soon become clear to you.

Although junk food is a no-no when you are on a diet, many people who do eat healthy foods still indulge in their favorite snacks from time to time. There is nothing wrong with treating yourself from time to time as long as you don’t make it a practice or overindulge. There are also differences in what vegetarians term “healthy foods”, so if you don’t eat meat, it does mean that you exclude all animal proteins from your diet. Proteins are essential nutrients that vegetarians might be at risk of not getting unless they pay particular attention to their foods.

Soy is comparable to animal protein and should be included in a daily diet if you are a vegetarian. Other sources of protein include

* Dry beans

* Peas

* Lentils

Some grains and vegetables are also good sources of protein. Soy milk and tofu are good sources of calcium and green leafy plants are a good source of iron.

Even if you are not a vegetarian, these foods will help to complement your diet and help you to feel full. All dieters should include a multi-vitamin and mineral supplement just to make sure. Drinking at least 8 glasses of water a day helps to flush out the burned calories and keep your body functioning the way it should.

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