Do I need a new diet? Is mine safe?

The European Union (EU) are constantly assessing the formulations of very low calorie diets (VLCDs) such as the Lipotrim pharmacy weight management programme.

There has been no recommendation to alter the formulation of VLCDs that has been passed as law in the EU. The EU laws cover all EU members including the UK and Ireland.

The discussions within the political powers has over the years revolved around whether:

• VLCDs should include MORE Linoleic Acid and Linolenic Acid (Omega-6 and omega-3 essential fatty acids)
• VLCDs should include MORE protein
• VLCDs should contain more calories

Our blog post on the Lipotrim Ireland website discusses these issues in detail.

The list above is just that: a list of possible talking points. VLCDs in their current form have a much valued position in the prevention and treatment of obesity, with an excellent safety record spanning decades.

The scare stories will unfortunately most likely carry on, but rest assured the Lipotrim programme, delivered by healthcare professionals throughout the UK and Ireland, is still delivering safe and significant clinical outcomes every day.

https://ireland.lipotrim.com/?p=611&preview=true

Pharmacy funding cuts - is homeopathy the answer?

Pharmacy funding cuts are starting to dig deep, and many pharmacies face closure if new, profitable revenue streams, are not found quickly.

2017 and beyond will be testing times for the community pharmacy sector, so every opportunity to keep these foundations of the local high-street alive must be sought.

IS EVERY OPPORTUNITY A WISE CHOICE FOR THE REPUTATION OF PHARMACY?

The NHS is choosing to stop paying for homeopathic medications.  A long overdue action.  Leave homeopathy to the health food industry.  Pharmacy is not into faith healing.

In The Chemist & Druggist, a renowned pharmacy publication, a recent article has sparked many comments from the pharmacy profession as to whether "Homeopathy could be pharmacy's saviour from funding cuts". 

Comments made by pharmacists and those closely connected to the pharmacy sector were not very complimentary to the idea of capitalizing on the sale of homeopathic remedies:

·         Great. Let's do a proper return to the 17th century and bring back purging and bloodletting as well.

·         David, why are you suggesting this rubbish. The future of the profession, if it has one, is not in quack remedies with no scientific basis.

These are strong replies so what is the issue with homeopathy?

What is homeopathy?

The British Homeopathic Association describes homeopathy in this definition:

“Homeopathy is a natural form of medicine used by over 200 million people worldwide to treat both acute and chronic conditions. It is based on the principle of ‘like cures like’. In other words, a substance taken in small amounts will cure the same symptoms it causes if taken in large amounts.”

For those involved in the homeopathic industry, worth over £46 million according to a Mintel report on Complimentary medicines 2007, homeopathy works. The belief and faith in homeopathy can be very strong in those wishing to use it, but for pharmacy medicine is not a religion.

Pharmacy works with facts and strong evidence. The Healthy Living Pharmacy status pharmacies are working towards within the new pharmacy contract, will strengthen this notion.

Conventional medicine, using evidence based science rather than anecdotal claims, views homeopathy as nothing more than a placebo, yet surprisingly  has been available through the NHS for many years. The time has now come, with the NHS running out of money, to cut back on many peripheral and worthless services, with homeopathy being one such cut for many Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs). If homeopathy is no longer prescribed on the NHS, the over the counter market for such "treatments" will be opened further. Could this be pharmacy's best opportunity to plug the pharmacy funding cuts?  Should it be?

Plugging the pharmacy funding cuts - the right way.

It is not surprising for pharmacists to refuse to accept this opportunity with homeopathy.  A complimentary therapy, with little clinical evidence, is not a treatment option. Real medical problems must be treated by real medicines.   

Pharmacists are very highly trained experts in medicines and to fall en-mass into recommending non-evidence based therapies, purely for financial gain, violates the pharmacy code of ethics. Luckily for the pharmacy profession most pharmacists will refuse this option as seen in the loud responses to the article. Fraudulent medical therapies could put pharmacists at serious risk, when proper treatment options are not provided and lead to more serious medical conditions.

One answer has been staring pharmacy in the face for over 15 years....

Flu vaccines? Recently the pharmacy sector has turned towards flu-jabs as a means to stay profitable with a recent article in "The Pharmacist" magazine titled "Fantastic flu vaccine effort by community pharmacy" waxing lyrical about the 817,000 flu vaccinations achieved by pharmacies in 2016/17 season. 

This, however, equates to a paltry £30 profit per pharmacy per month on average.

Pharmacy needs to look further than just turnover and service uptake. 

Profits now matter a great deal too. Flu-jabs are not the saviour of pharmacy after all.

So who could be a saviour of pharmacy?

Lipotrim

Lipotrim is an evidence based weight management programme offered exclusively  by healthcare professionals, including nearly 2000 pharmacies, across the UK and Ireland. The wealth of evidential  data,  produced from audits, has demonstrated the value of Lipotrim, not only to the patients treated successfully, with significant weight losses and reduced medication needs, but also for the pharmacies with highly profitable remuneration.

This white paper, "Treating obesity and excess weight using a holistic, Pharmacy based approach to weight management", from Waistaway shows what a single pharmacist has achieved. With weight losses in this one study averaging above 11%, even for type 2 diabetics.

Lipotrim is replicating this achievement in pharmacy across the UK and Ireland. 

Weight management is hot topic with the National Diabetes Prevention Programme being rolled out in the UK and a similar programme in Ireland. It is time for more pharmacies to realise they are in the perfect location, and that it is a perfect time to really utilise their expertise in medicine and general health, tackling the obesity and diabetes crisis head-on.

Contact Lipotrim now to request information on how to join Lipotrim as a patient or a pharmacy

on 0800 413 735 (UK)

on 00353 (0) 1525 5636 (ROI)

or email lipotrim@lipotrim.co.uk

Donald Trump vs exercise?

Trump's theory of energy

A theory of human energy, attributed to Donald Trump, states;

The human body is "like a battery, with a finite amount of energy, which exercise only depletes."

This theory is taken from the biography written by The Washington Post's Mike Kranisch and Marc Fisher titled "Trump Revealed" (August 2016).

It is with the usual spoonful of wariness when it comes to a "Trumpism" that we look further into this "theory".

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/donald-trump-doesn-exercise-believes-human-body-bat-article-1.3170563

Is the human body like a battery?

The human body, like in all mammals, is warm blooded. We are a homeothermic species and our thermoregulation occurs by regulating metabolic processes. When it is cold outside we consume and burn calories so that the body can maintain a body temperature higher than the environment. Colder conditions and exercise is indeed costing us energy in the form of calories, just like a battery drains as the energy is used.

A battery however will not see any benefit from being moved a mile further away from its position ("exercise") because it is a stand-alone energy source, no more no less. It is charged to store calories and then releases them to operate machinery. The exercise we humans achieve will indeed deplete the energy we "contain" but we neither burn so much that our energy runs out (anywhere near completely) nor do we see a zero benefit from exercise.
It is reported that Donald Trump has stopped his exercise regimen after taking a dim view of the benefits of exercise, seeing it as draining the body of its limited energy, presumably arguing that the energy saved helps him in his political life.

His use of the battery analogy is partly true but doesn't take into account the vast amounts of energy stored as fat and glycogen in the body, especially in the overweight population, being more than enough to prevent complete depletion. He also forgets the very important charging of the human battery in the form of consumption of food and drink. In these days of increasing levels of obesity we are currently, on average, charging up the human battery more than is required.

But what about the health of Trump?

Along with other information requests, Trump has not released his health records, so no evidence can be cited on any ill health as a result from a lack of exercise. Visibly overweight, if not clinically obese, Trump will be suffering from an increased risk of long-term health conditions, such as hypertension, type 2 diabetes or cancer. If Mr Trump does indeed do little or no exercise, one wishes for his long-term health that he regularly eats a balanced healthy diet containing a suitable number of calories. It has long since been proven that those carrying excess body weight are at increased health risk but since moderate amounts of exercise burns negligible calories, any ill health, now or in the future, would be attributed to an increased consumption of calories rather than his belief that exercise is bad for you.

Trump was quoted in a news story from Yahoo news: "All my friends who work out all the time - they're going for knee replacements - they're a disaster"

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-thinks-exercise-bad-depletes-limited-energy-195234796.html It is important to clarify here that the many health benefits of exercise outweigh the risks of injury. Moderate aerobic exercise is also safe for a majority of people.

How is this all linked to Lipotrim?

Lipotrim is a Very Low Calorie Diet, using nutrient complete formula foods, specially formulated to deliver all the nutrition a person needs in the minimum number of calories. The body is essentially forced to act like a battery, delivering from its stored fat the energy required to power the body minute by minute, day by day. When this dietary method is used for the overweight and obese population, rapid comfortable weight loss occurs. Exercise is encouraged for the long term benefits to health it offers but will not drive the rate of weight loss further.
Lipotrim is therefore especially suitable for those patients unable to exercise to the levels where meaningful weight loss occurs, for example in the very obese, bedridden or wheelchair patients.

www.lipotrim.co.uk

Tel    0800 413 735

Fake news? Khloe Kardashian poster and body shaming.

Are diet adverts fake news?

Protein world are again making the headlines with their recent poster showing Khloe Kardashian in a leotard. The watchdogs have given the poster the all clear, but calls to the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, to ban it from the London underground network grow.

"People complained to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) that it was socially irresponsible because it promoted a competitive approach to dieting"

The ASA (Advertising standards Authority) is under pressure to crack down on advertisers who objectify and sexualise women or present unrealistic body images yet the poster (below) seems to have crossed this boundary.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-4488856/Diet-products-poster-CLEARED-body-shaming.html

In previous clashes with the ASA, printed promotional material was stopped, not due to the body image depicted, but the associated poster text contained series of unsubstantiated health and weight loss claims for Protein World supplements.

What are the real issues for "fake news"?

Here are a few questions to ask yourself:

What constitutes a realistic promotion of weight loss?

Where is the boundary set for body shaming?

Is a picture of a slim person shameful?

Is a picture of an obese person shameful?
Do you want to see an aspirational picture at all?

If we are not wanting to see aspiriational pictures of weight loss, what is the overall message we as a society want to give, when it comes to weight and health? Would we be happier seeing pictures on billboards depicting the effect obesity has on the heart, or the liver, as we currently see on cigarette packets?

What would you like to hear when it comes to weight loss claims? Weight loss reduces risk from many long term health conditions; hypertension, cancer, type 2 diabetes to name a few. If a diet achieves weight loss the health benefits follow, so surely claims are always possible to be made? How can we substantiate the claims so you know what to expect?

 

 

How do you get through the fake diet news and answer these questions?

Our best advice is to try and avoid taking adverts at face value and consult your healthcare professional. Your doctor or pharmacist will draw from their knowledge on overall health, medical conditions and weight management to give you the tailored advice needed to diet successfully and healthily. 

The network of pharmacies across the UK and Ireland, supplying the Lipotrim pharmacy programme, are not only highly trained in weight management but also have the ability to audit their weight loss data. These pharmacies and other healthcare professionals can quickly give you an up-to-date snap-shot of the weight loss results they are achieving.

Lipotrim is an evidence based, nutritionally complete weight management programme run by qualified health professionals.

Call Lipotrim on 0800 413 735 for advice or to find your local pharmacy

For Republic of Ireland call local rate 00353 (0) 1 525 5636