What is Functional Nutrition?
What is Functional Nutrition? So to answer that first lets understand why maintaining nutrition is important?
What we eat has good and bad effects on our health. Hence, maintaining the correct diet and choosing correct food matter while you try to achieve optimum nutrition. A nutritional imbalance can cause you several chronic health conditions, similarly a correct nutrition can help you recover many health issues.
Functional nutrition is a holistic approach where foods are being used as medicine to prevent many diseases and improve health conditions. The functional nutrition process focuses on the specific concern and the nutritionist designs a nutrition plan for the client to address the underlying causes of health issues. It is a personalized process to address one specific health concern. This takes the person’s food choice, lifestyle and environment into consideration. The nutritionist follows a process to identify the foods that work and don’t work for your body, health and makes a diet plan accordingly.
Amazing Facts about Nutrition:
Nutrition has the main effect in our body. This is because the foods and the liquids we consume contain a particular amount of nutrition which works for our mental and physical growth. There are many facts about nutrition that can surprise you when you come to know about them.
Nutrition and Neuroscience
One of the interesting facts is there is a strong connection between nutrition and neuroscience. Science talks about how diet affects the brain. It is all about studying the effect of diet on neurochemistry, behavior, cognition and how a proper diet can improve a possible neurological problem.
Added Sugar is Unhealthy
Though the added sugar such as corn syrup and table sugar increases the test of the food but this is a disaster for you. The added sugar empties the calories which cause you to gain weight.
There is No Perfect Diet for Everyone
We all have different body types, genetics, and accomplish different activities every day. Accordingly, we all cannot have a similar diet as we don’t have the same appetite. For some low-carb diets can be suitable and for some high carb diets are suitable. Considering the fact that a specific diet that works for someone may not work for others you must do some experimentation to figure out the suitable one for you. Here the choice of food matters the most.
Eat Vegetables to Improve Healthy
Vegetables are rich in vitamins, minerals, fiber, antioxidants and many more things. Hence eating vegetables everyday can improve many health issues and is great for maintaining good health conditions. It has been observed that eating vegetables can reduce risk of several chronic diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes etc.
Do Not Avoid a Vitamin D Deficiency:
Vitamin D is very essential for our body and skin as this works as a hormone in our body. Our skin makes Vitamin D when we go out and our skin gets exposed to ultraviolet rays.
Often people stay inside or use sunscreen to avoid exposure to the UV rays that blocks the vitamin D generation process in the skin. This causes Vitamin D deficiency which causes many serious diseases, such as cancer, diabetes, osteoporosis and others.
Eat Unprocessed Foods
Unprocessed foods are healthy because they contain many of the nutrients but while a food gets processed many healthy nutrients such as fiber get removed. Also the additional ingredients used to enhance the test of the foods while processing makes the food unhealthier. The processed foods contain harmful ingredients, added sugar and trans fats.
When Functional Nutrition Can be Helpful?
Well we have understood the role of nutrition in our body lets now understand why Functional nutrition is important?
Functional nutrition is helpful for improving overall health. Functional nutrition helps to prevent digestive issues, chronic disease or to prevent and improve a specific disease or health condition. A functional nutritionist sets a goal to fight with a specific disease and that varies depending upon the nutritional need and the health condition of the person. The nutritionist considers each individual as a whole while taking up a holistic approach to a person’s nutrition. The functional nutritionist customizes the diet plan considering the client’s few factors such as food allergies, lifestyle, exercise regime and their current mental status. A functional nutrition plan can be helpful for a person who has Digestive issue, Nutrient deficiencies, Obesity, Autoimmune issues, Sleep disorders, Metabolic syndrome, Eating disorders, Anxiety or depression, Pain management and Body issues.
Benefits of Functional Nutrition:
Optimizing Cellular Health
The functional nutrition enhances cellular energy production and improves repairing mechanisms which in turn slows down cellular aging and increases vitality. This holistic nutrition plan gives your body what it needs and makes you understand about the better nutritional choices.
Maintains Metabolic Health
This improves metabolic health by following a holistic diet plan that stabilizes blood sugar and manages lipid profiles. By managing the blood sugar it helps you to maintain insulin level, cholesterol levels and metabolic health.
Mood Management
Improved diet can keep your mood stable and fresh. The functional nutrition diet plan supports many neurological functions that help you to achieve mental clarity, overall good mental health and emotional stability.
Managing Gut Health
Functional nutrition focuses on consumption of microbiome-friendly foods to improve our digestive system and nurture the gut-brain axis.
Prevents Chronic Disease
Functional nutrition helps to improve conditions like diabetes, cancer, cardiovascular disease by limiting the consumption of processed foods, calories, sugar and sodium and allows you to eat whole grain, fruits and vegetables, cruciferous vegetables and plant-based meals.
Follow the Functional Nutrition Eating Strategy:
A functional nutrition diet is a best practice to address your specific health concerns. In fact, by following this nutritional plan you may achieve your personal health goal. It is just that you need to align with the strategies and principles that this functional nutritional diet requires. Below are the principles of the functional nutrition diet that you must follow:
Focus on Essential Nutrients
Nutrients that our body derives from the food we eat are used to make the building blocks of our entire body. Which is why nutrients like vitamins, minerals, essential fatty acids, essential fatty acids, amino acids, complex carbohydrates and probiotics are responsible for keeping your body functioning well. By offering the body with the ones that it needs to function you are setting your system up for a good health condition.
Avoid Toxic Growing Conditions
In today’s world we must understand what we are eating. The knowledge about foods would help you to follow the functional nutritional diet effectively. For example foods like Factory-farmed animal products, GMO crops, and pesticide-laced produce we never used to eat for like 80 or 100 years ago but we are eating them now to fill our digestive system but these all have extreme effects on our health. So it is important to identify foods that contain exactly what you need and nothing more.
Keep the Microbiome High
The bacteria in the stomach are collectively called microbiomes. Beneficial microbes are responsible for healthy digestion in our stomach. They are responsible for a myriad of health processes too that affect your immune system, memory formation, mental health, and risk of developing chronic diseases. Eating foods that are high in probiotics, help your microbial levels stay high and keep your immunity level high and functional.
Focus On Quality Foods
Instead of eating heavily processed foods focus on consumption of foods that are high in various nutrients. Heavily processed foods may kick you off from the functional diet so to achieve your goal you must stick to the quality foods. The functional nutrition plan suggests you eat whole foods, nutrient-dense foods and vegetables so that your body can absorb all the required macronutrients and micronutrients. This also boosts our detoxification abilities.
Look for Healthy Life off The Plate
Few areas of your life and lifestyle such as quality of your relationships, stress levels, and your sleep routine can have many impacts on your health. All these can affect how your body processes and assimilates the food you eat. Since the digestion process is associated with these elements, these all have a great impact on your diet plan. Fixing these life experiences can help you in achieving desired health goals by strengthening the functional diet.
Pair Carbs with Proteins or Fats
You can pair carbs with protein or fat to achieve steadier energy levels throughout the day. The steadier energy level results in increased performance. When you start taking carbs along with protein or fat this not only satisfies you but also helps you in losing weight.
Drink Half Your Body Weight
The functional nutritional diet not only helps you to stay healthy but also helps you to be fit by managing weight. A functional nutritionist suggests that you must drink water that equals half of your body weight. For example if you weigh around 150 pounds then you must drink 75 ounces of water per pay. People who work out every day must add 20 ounces more water in their daily routine.
We all know this does not happen easily so don’t start drinking that much water from the 1st day of your nutritional diet, instead you can try increasing the amount of drinking water slowly day by day. Following this process can improve energy levels, cognitive function.
Consume Antioxidants Based Foods
During the functional diet eat more antioxidants based foods. This can be found in a variety of vegetables and fruits. Functional nutrition suggests you to eat more vegetables and fruits because with the help of antioxidants in it you can neutralize free radicals in the body, this reduces oxidative stress and inflammation and finally antioxidants can help reduce risk of chronic disease.
Eat Foods High in Omega-3
Omega-3 which is high in anti-inflammatory can reduce pain and improve your performance. This helps you recover from workouts. Omega-3 rich foods are; fatty fishes such as mackerel, salmon, and sardines and plant-based options like chia seeds, flaxseeds and walnuts.
Examples of Functional Foods for Functional Diet:
I hope you have understood what is functional nutrition and how it works for our health. Since the functional nutritional diet is a special kind of diet for your health, the foods for the functional nutrition plan cannot be some average fruits, veggies, or grains. The foods that you eat during the functional diet offer several powerful health benefits beyond offering some basic nutrition to our body. They are the tools for you to achieve a specific health goal. The functional foods are rich in vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and probiotics. This includes berries, nuts, fatty fish, oats, soy, yogurt and many more. Some of the modified functional foods are fortified eggs, unsweetened granolas and healthy juice.
Functional Foods in Your Diet:
Berries
Berries are sweet, juicy and rich in various nutrients. They are considered as a super food and contain high amounts of nutrients and vitamins.
Almonds
Almonds are rich in antioxidants that help you to manage cholesterol level.
Hemp Seeds
Hemp seeds are not only high in vitamins and minerals but also contain essential fatty acids, omega-6 and omega-3. They also contain iron, zinc, calcium and a great source of plant-based protein that are helpful for your health and managing some chronic diseases.
Broccoli
Broccolis contain a higher amount of Vitamin C. This also contains a chemical called sulforaphane which is helpful for patients with type 2 diabetes. By controlling the sugar level this helps the patient manage type 2 diabetes.
Oats
Oats are a good source of fiber which keeps you full for a long period. This helps you in losing weight. Along with fiber, oats also contain protein, calcium, vitamins, and amino acids which help you lower blood cholesterol.
Chickpeas
When you go for a functional nutritional diet Chickpeas are a great source of dietary fiber, protein, vitamins, and minerals for vegetarians and vegans. This on the go legume contains plant-based protein. Chickpeas help to improve digestion and lower the risk of diabetes and heart disease by regulating sugar and insulin.
Cinnamon
Cinnamon has antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties and it is also helpful for people with high blood sugar.
Coffee
A functional diet allows you to consume beverages to help boost your energy. Coffee with its caffeine content helps to boost energy. Not only can that, drinking coffee can be helpful in preventing some chronic diseases such as type 2 diabetes, and liver disease.
Salmon
The human body cannot produce essential fatty acids such as omega-3 on its own. We consume that by eating foods that contain omega-3. Sea foods like Salmon fish which are high in omega-3s can be consumed during the functional diet to meet the body needs. It has been seen that Omega-3 is helpful for cardiovascular disease and Alzheimer’s disease. It also helps to improve brain function.
There are many more items that have been considered as functional foods.
In whole grains barley, buckwheat, brown rice, and couscous can be consumed during this diet. Fermented foods such as tempeh, kombucha, kimchi, kefir, sauerkraut are considered as functional foods. In sea foods along with salmon we can eat sardines, anchovies, mackerel, and cod to meet the need of Omega-3 in our body.
How is Functional Nutrition better than Standard Nutrition?
Functional nutrition can be considered as functional medicine though the terms cannot be used interchangeably. Functional nutrition where the food works as an alternative to the functional medicines. The Functional medicine is a patient-centered practice which focuses on the body as a whole ecosystem. This works on the root cause of the symptoms of the disease whereas functional nutrition finds out the potential clues of those health issues assuming that these health issues can be caused by nutritional imbalance and works on those.
The functional nutritionist believes that food has the power to heal or harm. Hence by following a proper nutritional plan to address a specific health issue can give you a better result.
Standard nutrition is a nutritional guideline created for an entire population. You may follow a standard nutritional plan which is common for all but this may not give you the desired result but by following a functional nutrition plan you are actually customizing your nutrition according to your health goal. Hence this gives you a better result. For example, you are gaining weight despite eating healthier food and doing physical activities. This means even if you are following standard nutrition guidelines correctly but from the functional nutrition point of view there are many other things that can be done by understanding the need and goal which may give you a desired result.
Final Thought:
We hope we have answered the question on what is functional nutrition through this article. At the end of this article we just want to tell you that functional nutrition is all about you and your bio-individuality. It can never be common for all so it is you and your nutritionist who would decide your nutritional plan depending upon your health condition and health goal.
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