New approaches that focus on our relationships with food may be replacing old-fashioned guidance on eating regiments, Jennifer LaRue Huget writes in Monday’s Washington Post.
These tactics “focus on eating healthful whole foods and use psychology to aid our efforts to shed pounds,” she says. Even Weight Watchers has shifted this way, as evidenced by its new tag line: “Stop Dieting, Start Living.” See the full article on Washingtonpost.com, “Dieting vs. newer approaches to losing weight.”

Cornelius Parks & Recreation has spaces still availabe in a Monday moring class for Sun Style Tai Chi. Meanwhile, Davidson Parks & Rec has announced signups for a variety of March classes. Details below. Read the full story

Wellbeing Natural Health in Cornelius is offering a series of events in the coming weeks focusing on natural health, from a Chinese New Year celebration to a free talk on natural techniques for enhancing fertility. Read the full story

Lake Norman Regional Medical Center will host a Women’s Health Day, Health and Heart A La Carte, on Saturday, Feb. 6, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at The Charles Mack Citizen Center in downtown Mooresville. The event features Dona Caine Francis, acclaimed author and speaker on women’s issues, as the keynote, opening presenter. Read the full story

By DAVID BORAKS
DavidsonNews.net

As a lifelong athlete now past the 50 mark, the aches and pains that follow my Sunday morning pickup soccer games are a constant reminder of the limitations that come with aging. As I try to keep up with teens and twenty-somethings on the field, my brain remembers what I once could do; my body can’t do it it any longer. Pass the ibuprofen, please.

Some men think there’s another answer: hormones. The Sunday, Jan. 17, New York Times Magazine, has an article about a Sunday morning soccer player about my age – 51-year-old John Bellizzi – who uses vitamins and hormone injections to stay in the game. But, there are risks, the magazine notes. Read the full story

The World Health Organization and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say the swine flu, or H1N1 virus, may be easing in the northern hemisphere, though it remains a threat. Read the full story

Parks & Recreation Departments in Davidson and Cornelius are kicking off weight-loss challenge programs this month, with weekly weigh-ins and education sessions and cash prizes for the biggest losers. Read the full story

The H1N1 or swine flu virus has swept across the nation, but it has turned out to be one of the milder pandemics in recent history. Luck has played a part, the New York Times reports, but medical experts also say that a series of rapid but conservative decisions by federal officials worked out better than many had dared hope. “We did a lot of things right,” Dr. Andrew T. Pavia, chairman of the pandemic flu task force of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, told the Times. Read the full story

SOURCE: Lake Norman Regional Medical Center
MOORESVILLE - Lake Norman Regional Medical Center will hold a free educational seminar “Boost Your Weight Loss: Is Surgical Weight Loss Right for You?” on Thursday, Jan. 14, 7 p.m., at the Statesville Civic Center, 300 South Center Street, in Statesville. Read the full story

The writer is president and CEO of United HealthCare of North Carolina.

Garland Scott

By GARLAND SCOTT

Obesity is tipping the scales as one of North Carolina’s biggest problems. Over the last 20 years in North Carolina, the percentage of the population that is obese has increased from 12.9 percent to 29.5 percent.

That’s an alarming trend, and it’s playing out in just about every community across the country. In fact, it’s a trend that has catapulted obesity to one of the top health problem facing our state and our nation. Read the full story