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The relevance of nutrition in health Essay

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“Optimum nutrition is needed for optimum health”
Nutrition can be described as the science of consuming and utilizing foods in a natural medicinal way so as to provide the human body with optimum health by taking care of the body’s dietary needs. Nutritional science studies how the human body catabolizes and anabolizes certain groups of foods to see how they affect the repair and creation of new and old cells. Good nutrition and a healthy lifestyle, combined with regular physical activity, are essential to good health and wellbeing. Poor diet and lifestyle choices can lead to an increased susceptibility to disease, reduced immunity and impaired physical and mental development (World Health Organization 2009).

The role nutrition …show more content…

Both of these practices require implementation of a healthy and varied diet in order to achieve beneficial therapeutic outcomes (Community Services and Health Industry Skills Council 2013).

The relevance of considering dietary changes and nutritional supplementation in addressing nutritional status
Dietary changes and nutritional supplementation are well known as highly useful tools when attempting to correct a nutritional deficiency. Folic acid’s benefit in pregnancy is a well-documented example of this. Folate, also known as vitamin B9, is a micronutrient which can be found in foods such as green leafy vegetables, grains, cereals and meat. Folate has an important role in the synthesis of DNA and the division of cells. Significant folate deficiency can lead to several different birth defects including neural tube defects (NTD’s), spinal bifida and anencephaly (birth without part of the brain) as the neural tube is the embryonic precursor to the brain and spinal column. Folic acid, a synthetic form of folate, is used in multivitamin supplements because it is better absorbed by the body (Science Based Medicine 2013).
Recently, a meta-analysis was conducted on women who were planning to marry in an area of China which exhibited a high prevalence of NTD’s. They were asked to take 400mg of folic

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