Personal Beliefs about Eating Patterns

The way we are living, our attitude, our emotion, the basic mental state, how streamlined our minds are, the level of activity we are going through, all these are very much a part of our health. A person’s health is influenced by health behaviors that are part of their individual lifestyle. Any behavior that affects the individual physical health or any behavior individual believes may affect their physical health is health behavior or in a nutshell, a person's beliefs and actions regarding their health and well-being is health behavior. Health behavior is defined as “the activity undertaken by people for the purpose of maintaining or enhancing their health, preventing health problems, or achieving a positive body image” (Cockerham, 2014).

Although there are many health behaviors that could have been researched, the health behavior that I am going to be looking at in more detail in this essay is eating patterns, as I believe that eating patterns are one of the main fundamentals of good health. In this piece of work, I will be reflecting my belief about eating patterns and its dimension in terms of what characterized as healthy and risky eating patterns. I will also be reflecting on a factor that have influenced my beliefs about eating patterns with reference to health belief model. The essay will also include a conversation with a client who do not share my belief about the dimension of health behavior.

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An individual usual dietary intake and choice regarding food and beverages over a continuous period of time is what I understand from eating pattern. And there are various healthy eating patterns one can follow and several behaviors that one should limit to remain healthier throughout their life.

Healthy Behaviors

Eating Balance Diet

All kinds of foods and drinks that we consume daily have a significant effect on our physical and mental well-being. I believe that good amount of nutrition based on healthy diet plan is one essential factor that helps us to stay healthy. The main idea here is to include variety of food from all the food groups (carbohydrate, protein, vitamin, minerals, fats) in recommended amount in our daily intake so that we get all nutrients require for our body to function well. Each food group has different and important nutrients. As good nutrients are essential in every stage of our life from infant, adult to old age, most of the countries around the world have introduce their own dietary guideline. The Australian Dietary Guidelines provide recommendations (based on the latest scientific evidence) on how to eat a healthy diet which can improve the health of Australians and reduce the burden of preventable diet-related death, illness and disability. This guideline recommends the number of ‘standard serves’ we should consume from the five core food groups each day, for a nutritious and balanced diet: 1) vegetables (a standard serve is about 75g (100–350kJ)); 2) fruits (a standard serve is about 150g (350kJ)); 3) grain (cereal) (a standard serve is (500kJ)); 4) lean meat and poultry, fish, eggs, nuts and seeds, and legumes/beans (a standard serve is (500–600kJ)); milk, yogurt, cheese and or alternatives (a standard serve is (500–600kJ)) (‘Serve Sizes| Eat for Health’, 2019). As long as individual follows a healthy diet that contain a wide range of nutritious foods for sufficient intake of all nutrients, including vitamins and minerals, the health benefit sustains. A healthy diet can help you maintain a healthy body weight and decrease your risk of many diet-related chronic diseases, such as cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and some cancers (‘Healthy Eating Tips’, 2019).

Meal Timing and Meal Frequency

Maintaining proper meal time and meal frequency also plays significant role in living a healthier life, in my point of view. Eating regular meals not only help us prevent from hunger pain and avoid over, but also boost metabolism. Paying attention to our body’s hunger signals for when to eat and avoid eating just because others are eating automatically leads us to maintain that consistent routine time and frequency preventing us from binging and skipping meals. Timing meals and snacks to fit within 10-12 hours, such as between 6am and 6pm, may help promote weight loss, as well as decrease cardiovascular risk (‘Meal Timing and Frequency of Meals and Snacks for Optimal Health| Summit Medical Group’, 2019).

Water as a Vital Nutrient

We all are aware of the fact that keeping ourselves hydrated is crucial for health and well-being, yet many people do not consume enough water each day. Water is essential for performing various function of the body such as digestion, absorption transportation, and elimination of waste products. As our body cannot store water, we need fresh supplies of water every day to make up for losses from the process of excretion. “While all fluids help quench our thirst, as the Australian Guide to Healthy Eating recommends, water is the best drink of them all. All fluids count towards your daily fluid intake, but it is better if most of the fluid you drink is plain water” (‘Choose Water as a Drink: SA Health’, 2019).

Risky Behaviors

Consumption of Junk/Fast Food

In today’s busy world, trend of fast /junk food consumption and out-of-home eating behavior is growing day by day. As junk/fast foods are mostly consist of processed meats, refine carbohydrate, sodium and saturated/ trans-fats, and low in fiber and important nutrients like vitamin and minerals, frequent consumption of these foods can be taken as one of the main risks for the poor nutrients, leading to various heath condition. The Australian Dietary Guidelines categorized these foods (biscuits, cake, savory pastry pies, chocolate, sausage, cordial etc.) as discretionary choices and recommend limiting our intake of discretionary choices, as they are not part an essential part of a nutritious diet. Nutrition Australia advises limiting your intake of discretionary choices to a maximum of one serve per day (approx. 600kJ) (‘Serve Sizes| Eat for Health’, 2019). Eating junk food on a regular basis can lead to an increased risk of obesity and chronic diseases like cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and some cancers (‘Junk Food’, 2019).

Multitasking During Mealtime

As a result of busy lives, multitasking has made its way to the kitchen. While it seems convenient to have breakfast in trains, snack in front of the television, lunch while working and eat dinner while watching television, I believe it has a huge impact on our health and how our body treats to hunger and nutrients. When we are eating, our body does some important jobs. The first job is to let us know when we are full, and second is to digest food and absorb nutrients. So, if we are busy doing other things while eating our brain is not able to register the five tastes and signal our body to keep eating until it is able to experience taste perception, resulting in a higher probability of overeating. Multitasking impacts our digestive system and its ability to absorb nutrients. “Researchers in 2013 concluded that multitasking individuals who were consuming food were more likely to overeat” (van der Wal & van Dillen, 2013).

Tobacco/Alcohol Consumption

The health risk of using tobacco be it in any form cigarette, loose leaf roller and drinking alcohol are known to all. Use of tobacco and alcohol alone or together may lead to major health threats, such as cancers, cardio vascular diseases, chronic liver diseases. “Most people start smoking when they are in their teens. They might start because of peer pressure from their friends, because their parents smoke, or simply because they are teenagers and they want to push the boundaries and take risks” (‘Why Do People Smoke?’, 2019). In Australia it is illegal to advertise about tobacco and alcoholic drinks, and there is a guideline for Australian to follow on reducing the harm of drinking alcohol which is known as the NHMRC Alcohol Guideline. recommendations on alcohol consumption are made on the basis of ‘standard’ drinks consumed. A standard drink in Australia contains 10g of alcohol (equivalent to 12.5ml of alcohol).

Personal Beliefs Regarding Eating Patterns

There are various factors that have influenced my above-mentioned beliefs regarding eating patterns. In this part to the essay, I am the explaining about the factors that, in my opinion, have influence my belief as per popular health belief model. The health belief model attempts to explain and predict health behaviors by focusing on the attitudes and beliefs of individuals. The model defines the key factors that influence health behaviors as an individual's:

1. Perceived threat to sickness or disease (perceived susceptibility) and belief of consequence (perceived severity). Individual will start consuming nutritional and healthy diet if they suspect they are at the risk of developing health condition (such as cardiovascular diseases, diabetic, fatty liver, etc.) associated with lack of healthy diet, like junk/fast food, and its severity once the diseases is contracted.
2. Potential positive benefits of action (diet adherence). If they believe in the efficacy of dietary strategies (such as eating fresh home cooked meal instead of fast/junk food or including the right proportion of food from five food groups in meal as per individual’s dietary requirements), which are designed to help lower the risk of disease.
3. Perceived barriers to action (diet adherence). This factor includes possible negative consequences such as physical (gain/loss of weight), financial (expense of new foods), and psychological (lack of spontaneity in food choice) that stops individual’s from changing their unhealthy eating patterns.
4. Cues to action. Television programs, news article, events that guides individual to prepare and eat healthy food, and also wide availability of healthy food in retail and restaurant in a lower cost encourage people to act in changing their dietary habits.
5. Self‐efficacy. People have a sense of efficiency, adequacy, and believed they can successfully implement and sustain the new eating pattern (healthy), which is essential to produce the desired outcomes overcoming the barriers of behaviors.

In future I may meet many clients who will not share same belief regarding eating patterns. They may say things like:

Client: “Fast/junk is more convenient as I don’t have time to cook healthy meals”.

Me: “You can try to cook any healthy meals may be just once a week or may be on the weekend, or how about trying meal planning? Cook the meals in different sets on the weekend and store them in freeze so that you can just heat up and eat on week days”.

Client: “In a constant rush between my work and my university these days, forget about the breakfast, I even don’t have any time for lunch some days. But I always have a dinner, so it’s fine”.

Me: “Starving yourself by skipping meals throughout the day and stuffing only at dinner changes your body’s metabolic function, leading to several health problem like diabetics, ulcer. Instead, eat just any piece of fruits you like in the morning and pack some dry fruits, nuts, or peanuts so that you can eat it anywhere, anytime throughout the day. This will prevent your hunger pain and lower the chances of over eating at night”.

Client: “I don’t like plain water I hardly drink one glass a day. I love cordial, juice or soft drinks. I think all fluids does the same job, so as long as these drinks quench my thirst, it doesn’t matter”.

Me: “In my opinion swapping sugary drinks with plain water is best choice. As these drinks are lower in nutritional value and often contains high sugar and acidity levels, consuming it frequently in daily basis rises risk the chances of health issues like increasing bold sugar level, tooth decay. They are expensive too. So, why not make flavor water in your home rather than buying artificially sweetened drinks if you don’t like drinking just plain water? For added flavor, try adding squeezing some lime/lemon juice and some mint leaves or grated ginger. You can also, add slices of fruit (fresh or frozen) such as orange, strawberries, cucumber as per your taste. This way, you don’t have to drink plain water, but at the same time you also limit your daily intake of artificially sweetened drinks or other beverages”.

Conclusion

Summing up, as a nurse, I know that helping my patients make healthier food choices is important, and I am also aware that not all people will think same way as I do. My patients may have some valid reasons for why changing their eating pattern is difficult, but it will be my duty to educate them about how choosing and consuming healthy food over time will have lasting health benefits and inspire them to adopt healthier eating patterns.

References

1. Cockerham, W. (2014). Health Behavior. The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Health, Illness, Behavior, and Society, 764-766. doi: 10.1002/9781118410868.wbehibs296.
2. Behaviours & Risk Factors - Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports-data/behaviours-risk-factors
3. Serve Sizes| Eat For Health. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.eatforhealth.gov.au/food-essentials/how-much-do-we-need-each-day/serve-sizes
4. Healthy Eating Tips. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/healthyliving/healthy-eating-tips
5. Choose Water as a Drink: SA Health. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.sahealth.sa.gov.au/wps/wcm/connect/public+content/sa+health+internet/healthy+living/healthy+eating/healthy+eating+tips/choose+water+as+a+drink
6. Junk Food. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.healthywa.wa.gov.au/Articles/J_M/Junk-food
7. Van der Wal, R., & van Dillen, L. (2013). Leaving a Flat Taste in Your Mouth. Psychological Science, 24(7), 1277-1284. doi: 10.1177/0956797612471953.
8. Why Do People Smoke?. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.helptoquit.com.au/smoking-facts/why-do-people-smoke
9. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/reports/alcohol-harm-reduction-faq.pdf
10. Meal Timing and Frequency of Meals and Snacks for Optimal Health| Summit Medical Group. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.summitmedicalgroup.com/news/nutrition/meal-timing-and-frequency-meals-and-snacks-optimal-health/