The Doctors: Is Your Body Type Determined by Your Genes?
The Doctors TV show informed their viewers that your genes are only a small part of the equation when it comes to what your health is like. They also shared the story of how Mark Foster from Foster The People encouraged his friend and bandmate to lose 80 pounds.
Your genes determine your height, skin and eye color, and factors about your health. You are two to six times more likely to be diagnosed with diabetes if a parent or a sibling has the disease.
The Doctors: Exercise Reduces Diabetes Risk
Mark Foster of the band Foster the People challenged his friend and photographer Andy to get healthy and lose 80 pounds in eight months for a prize of $20,000. (Mat Hayward / Shutterstock.com)
Oxford researchers recently identified the gene for human insulin sensitivity. However, strength training for a half hour a day can reduce your diabetes risk by 34%. When it comes to weight, children of obese parents have a 50% risk of getting diabetes, but when kids play team sports they can change those statistics.
Limiting your exposure to the chemical BPA, which is found in some cans and bottles, can reduce your risk as well. If Americans could take out one teaspoon of salt from their diets each day, 30,000 strokes and 50,000 heart attacks could be prevented each year.
The Doctors: $20K Weight Loss Challenge
Two out of three Americans are obese, and 29-year-old Andy was one of them. Andy needs to lose 80 pounds in eight months to win $20,000 as part of the Foster Challenge. How much money would it take to get you to lose weight?
For the last year and a half, Andy has been on tour as a photographer with the band Foster the People. The lead singer Mark Foster challenged Andy to lose the weight. He’s two and a half weeks into his weight loss journey and has already lost 10 pounds.
Andy changed his diet and started exercising. He said he’s more conscious about what he’s eating and has even started venturing into the vegetable department at the grocery store for things like broccoli slaw and mixed greens. He has also cut out alcohol and is sticking to water.
The Doctors: Andy’s Foster Challenge for a Healthier Life
Dr. Travis Stork sat down with Andy to give him advice from a medical perspective. Dr. Stork said that Andy carries a lot of weight in his midsection which weighs down on his organs. He weighted Andy, who is 6’1,’’ and he came in at 281 pounds.
According to Dr. Stork, being overweight goes hand in hand with having high blood pressure. He checked Andy’s and said it was pretty good.
Andy joined the rest of the doctors on the show to talk about his challenge. Andy said that as of that morning, he was down 13 pounds. Dr. Andrew Ordon was curious about why Mark chose the number 80, and Andy said he thinks that 80 in eight months just worked.
The Doctors: Mark Foster of Foster the People
Mark called in to The Drs. and said that if he had to spend $20,000 to save his friend’s life he’d do it again. Mark said that he hopes the challenge is an inspiration to others. Dr. Stork applauded Mark and said that he loved that he wasn’t doing this for any superficial reasons, this was just because he was worried about his friend.
The Doctors: Exercise, Breakfast & Protein Change Your Genes
Dr. Stork shared The Doctors’ three tips to fight fat, change your body and change your genes.
- Eat within an hour of waking up. If you wait longer than this to eat breakfast, you’re 50% more likely to be obese.
- Eat protein at breakfast. This will help reduce your cravings for calories throughout the day.
- Change genes with exercise. For up to 16 hours after one workout, your blood pressure will be lower and your cardiovascular system will be more efficient. After a month of working out, your muscles will be more efficient as well and there will be lower levels of insulin and cortisol in your body.
After a few months of exercising and definitely after a year, your body becomes a fat burning machine. At the end of your DNA strands are telomeres (pronounced tea-low-meres), and the shorter they are, the shorter your lifespan is. Exercise can actually change the length of these telomeres.
The Doctors: 80 Pounds in Eight Months
Andy admitted that he hasn’t had a physical in a long time so The Doctors sent him to the California Health and Longevity Institute for some testing, and also gave him a nutritionist and a personal trainer. Do you think it would be easier to lose weight with these tools?
The Drs. will be checking in on Andy throughout his 80 pounds in eight months challenge, and if you want to follow along you can check out his blog.
What a great thing to do for his friend