Myth: People go to a Nutritionist only when they need to lose weight.
Fact: Anyone can consult a nutritionist at any stage of their growth! Every person has a different calorific requirement and set of nutrients that are needed at different stages of development. It is a Nutritionists job to guide them through each of those stages and ensure that their growth is happening at an optimum level.
So, in general, visiting a Nutritionist can help you get to know your body better and help you walk the healthy road to life but let’s also talk about some specific situations where seeing a Nutritionist can come in handy-
1. Food Allergies:
This includes things like gluten or lactose intolerance. You know something is wrong when you’re developing a rash or having irregular bowel movements when you eat a particular kind of food. This is a good time to visit a nutritionist because you need someone to help you go through the elimination diet to find out which food(s) is the cause of the issue.
In case of a gut malabsorption, you need to make sure that you are getting the right nutrients. A Nutritionist will understand what the food triggers are and create a customized diet to keep you happy and healthy!
2. Digestive Issues (Eg. Ulcerative Colitis, Crohn’s, etc):
The gut of people with these issues is so sensitive that they can pass out due to a severe reaction to certain foods. To prevent symptoms such as diarrhoea, vomiting, fainting spells due to a lack of energy, and promote overall body health, a Nutritionist can prep the perfect diet plan for you.
3. High Cholesterol/ Inflammation Parameters:
Certain patients could be at risk of heart disease due to high Cholesterol, ESR and hs-CRP. Such patients need to make sure they bring down the inflammation because high levels of inflammation= a good environment for infections to develop.
4. Vitamin deficiencies:
You may think that Google Guru can help with this one but without guidance you may consume an excess of randomised supplements which we all know is always bad. Furthermore, you need to be guided on when to take these supplements, dosage or whether to take it at all! A nutritionist can help you achieve balance through natural supplements (aka foods) by means of nutrition plans.
5. PCOS, Thyroid, Fatty Liver:
These problems generally occur if there is some dysfunction in the biochemical reactions in the body. A nutritionist can help remove foods that cause inflammation in the body and add in more foods that bring down the inflammation to ensure that the normal mechanism continues to take place inside the body.
6. Pregnancy:
Anyone going through fertility issues (which also may be a side effect of PCOS/PCOD/Thyroid) can also consult a nutritionist to help solve the issue.
Any woman trying to get pregnant can also book a consultation to create a healthy environment for the baby to grow. Here, a Nutritionist ensures that the woman is getting all essential pre-natal nutrients to promote healthy growth of the baby.
7. Diabetes and Hypertension:
People are often misguided on what to do and what not to do in these situations. A Nutritionist helps the client understand what kind of foods cause an insulin spike and how to avoid them to maintain a normal insulin level and increase the overall quality of life.
8. Athletes:
Athletes who play at a regional or national level have heavy strength training. In the process, they expend a lot of energy and therefore need to eat well. A Nutritionist can ensure that they are getting their essential protein, vitamins, minerals and carbohydrates and meeting their daily calorific requirement to recover the lost energy.
9. Weight Management:
Weight gain can be a cause of thyroid, PCOS, Diabetes, and other such problems which are caused due to a generally unhealthy or imbalanced lifestyle. Therefore, by a sort of chain reaction, bringing your weight down can resolve the other issues as well.
If someone wants to gain weight, a nutritionist can help check gut health and build a diet which ensures that they are getting enough calories to support general health as well as exercise routines.
Information provided by Sahana Dasharathi
Written and designed by Shria Bellalcheroo