THE WASTING SYNDROME: Using Nutrition To Gain Weight

THE WASTING SYNDROME: Using Nutrition To Gain Weight

Being Alive Newsletter; Being Alive/Los Angeles - September 93
Jennifer Jensen, RD

What a concept!! If you need to add weight, the correct way to do it is to eat more calories for more energy, and do strengthening exercises to fortify existing muscle mass. So there are both nutritional and exercise programs to develop in preventing wasting.

From the nutritional perspective, the following ideas will be useful for anyone living with HIV/AIDS. Due to individuality, some suggestions won't work for you but others will.

There are some "rules" about nutrition-based wasting prevention. The first, two are about foods you must always avoid. First, no unsafe food, like undercooked or raw eggs. And second, don't eat anything you don't like. That's the "Two-Rule" basic philosophy of nutritional remedies for everyone, regardless of HIV status.

The first-line nutritional approach to weight-gain is to consume more calories (energy in) than you burn (energy out) each day. While this may be basic to many readers, I've been surprised that many people don't know that it's calories in food that produce weight gain.

The third "rule" of nutrition for weight-gain is "Make every bite count." This is now the third newsletter article in which I've engaged in "salad-bashing." Salads are NOT recommended for weight-gain nor for most of our diets anyway. Lettuce, which is mostly water and fiber, fills you up before your meal (the water), and helps food out easier at the other end (the fiber). So, salads could waste time and appetite. Additionally, they could present food safety concerns with hard-to-wash salad greens.

High-calorie foods are often high in fat. Measure for measure, fat has about three-times more calories than non-fat foods, making it the most "calorie-dense" way to eat for weight gain.

Adding lower-fat calories to your food day can also be easy. There are many brands and types of liquid meals like Ensure, Sustacal, Resource, Opti HealthGain, Nutren, and others. The basic criterion for you to use in making your selection from among these products is taste but read further for hints on "taste control."

If aromas cause nausea and some of these canned meals are pretty nasty in the odor department drink from a sports glass with straw and cover. No odor means no nausea means no vomiting!

If you're not lactose intolerant (i.e., if you digest milk easily), you may be well advised to use less costly and more widely available Instant Breakfast. It usually tastes better and is much less expensive than the canned nutritionals mentioned earlier.

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This information is designed to support, not replace, the relationship that exists between you and your doctor.
©1993. AEGIS.