Fresh Focus

Ever wonder about the connection between sleep and body weight? Tune in to this episode as Angie, Dietitian and MOVE! Facilitator at the St Louis VA Health Care System, talks about ways to improve your sleep hygiene and how the MOVE! Weight management program can help you reach your health goals. This episode will educate you on how sleep can influence weight and provides tips to increase sleep qu...

A weight plateau can be a challenge and barrier we face when we are trying to better manage our weight. Find out how to set yourself up for success when experiencing this issue. Tune in to this episode to find the best way continue moving forward with your goals. Aimee Wittmaier with the Kansas City VA Medical Center provides specific strategies to help you along your journey!   Host Bio: Fresh Fo...

Exercise is such a great thing for our bodies and there are numerous ways to modify activities to avoid pain and to make them more comfortable. It is possible to increase activity throughout the day no matter what your circumstance is! Listen to this episode as Dr. Raine Bradshaw, a Physical Therapist for Truman VA in Columbia, MO, speaks with Amy and shares how Veterans can incorporate physical a...

Navigating recipes can be a challenge when you are cooking for one. Common recipes are created for 4-6+ people. It is important to include a variety of foods to help you get all of the nutrients that you need, but how do you do this? Tune in to find out more about how a VA dietitian can help assist you in creating anindividualized meal plan for yourself! If you are worried about being able to cook...

Description:  You may or may not have heard of the MOVE! program at your VA before tuning into today’s episode.  However, MOVE has actually been around since 2006. MOVE! is the nation-wide weight management program designed to help Veterans lose weight and keep it off.  Using weekly sessions to keep participants involved on a regular basis, MOVE! highlights making healthy behavior changes in the a...

March is a whole month dedicated to promote the profession of Nutrition Services as well as delivering nutrition education to the public. A Registered Dietitian Nutritionist can help you improve your overall health and wellness. Episode #70 focuses on the topic of health-related marketing, and more importantly, how we perceive, and engage, with this information. VA Dietitians help to observe the c...

In episode #69 VA Dietitians discuss different meal planning strategies to better “fuel for the future” which is the 2023 theme of National Nutrition Month ®. For most people, hearing the word meal planning or meal prepping may elicit images of extra time cooking, pre-portioning the same meal into containers to be eaten throughout the week. And while that is one approach to meal planning that work...

In the United States the USDA indicates that 13.8 million people are considered food insecure. Food security is a federal measure of a household’s ability to provide enough food for every person in the household to have an active, healthy life. In this episode we take a closer look at food security, and explore a dietitians role in helping you reach your health goals.  

March is National Nutrition Month ® and is a chance to celebrate eating healthy. In episode #67, our VA Dietitians review tips for eating healthy on a budget. Specifically, whether you are buying groceries and cooking at home for yourself, including family members, or making the choice to enjoy food away from the home.

The body can do great things, but we need to give it time to do so. In fresh focus episode #66 we discuss exercise in relation to cardiac health. Dietitian Sieger provides signs to be mindful of when starting a physical activity routine, and strategies on how to include regular activity and exercise into our daily lives. Finding that individualized movement starting point is beneficial for our min...

Excessive sodium intake is a concern for 9 out of 10 Americans. Having less sodium in your diet may help you lower or avoid high blood pressure, which is a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke. Dietary changes have a huge impact when we are away from the home. Whether its dining out or at the grocery store, the decision of what to eat can quickly become overwhelming. Listen in Episode #6...

According to the American Heart Association, 1 in 4 heart failure patients are readmitted within 30 days of discharge from the hospital, and approximately half within 6 months. It is suggested that around one-fourth of these readmissions may be preventable. For patients being treated for heart disease, poor diet and medication compliance are the most common reasons for readmission. In episode #64,...

In a realistic world, heart healthy eating will have a different starting point for everyone. It might mean making a few smaller changes or bigger substitutions. If you are in the process of working toward eating healthier to reach your goals then listen in to episode #63, where Marion VA Dietitians review ways to limit processed foods that can be high in sugar and salt. Your local VA Dietitian ca...

VA Dietitians want to help encourage Veterans, their family, and caretakers to maintain heart health. Keeping our hearts healthy is important and nutrition can play a big role. In episode #62, listen along as Kristine, VISN 15 MOVE Coordinator reviews her top three lifestyle changes that can help improve your heart health.   Starting off with selecting a variety of high fiber colorful fruits and v...

There is a crucial transitional time after being discharged from the hospital where making changes could prevent the need to go back into the hospital. As Dietitians, we understand how hard it can be to digest nutritional information when discharged home from the hospital. Sometimes, there’s so much information at once, making it hard to find a starting place once you are back at home. In episode...

Would you be interested in watching a cooking class demo while being able to be sit in your own kitchen and have the opportunity to cook along with the instructor? That is exactly what the VA Healthy Teaching Kitchen classes involve!      Healthy Teaching Kitchens aim to improve health by teaching Veterans and their families how to make healthy food choices by showing them how to prepare foods. Pa...

Listen in on this episode of Fresh Focus , where VA Dietitian, Dr. Joel Hamilton talks all about how to spice up your diet with using an ingredient that you already have on hand, a potato! Why potatoes? Potatoes are inexpensive and generally accessible.   Learning several cooking tips using something simple as a potato can actually help build our confidence in the kitchen, and motivate us into try...

March is a whole month dedicated to promote the profession of Nutrition Services as well as delivering nutrition education to the public. A Registered Dietitian Nutritionist (RDN) can help you improve your overall health and wellness.   This year, for National Nutrition Month®, the team at Fresh Focus Podcast , welcome back Yaqutullah Ibraheem Muhammad, a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist from the...

It’s common to see misinformation about nutrition. Science is complicated and scientific research can be difficult to critically evaluate. Especially for nutrition, many aspects of the wellness industry are unregulated such as supplements and supplement companies. With all the confusing nutrition information out there, how do we know which experts to trust or how to tell a credible source from a n...

Have you ever seen a VA Dietitian? If not, you might be wondering what to ask once you are in the office. From what’s the best way to lose weight, what to eat when away from our homes, to how much sodium is too much are daily conversations in our specialty. Bethany, a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist from the Louis A Johnson VA , joins Fresh Focus on episode #56 where she answers the most common...

March is National Nutrition Month ® and is a chance to celebrate eating healthy. National Registered Dietitian Nutritionist day is also in March and is a chance to showcase dietitians as the food and nutrition experts. Each year we celebrate with a new theme and for 2022 the theme is “Celebrate a world of Flavors.” This means diversifying our food choices and being open to new flavors, cuisines an...

We are back with the sixth and final episode of the Fresh Focus podcast ’s Myth Busters series. We’ve explored so many topics over the course of the past five episodes- from carbohydrates, to metabolism, to gluten, dairy, the scale, and protein in vegetarian diets. We are rounding out the series with a myth that is a big misconception when people come into the world of nutrition- and that is in or...

Gluten and dairy and grains, oh my! In this episode of the Fresh Focus podcast ’s Myth Busters series, our host Megan Rivenburg, MS, former dietetic intern at the Bay Pines VA talks all about the ever so prevalent myths about gluten, dairy, gluten-free, and dairy-free diets.             Have you ever heard someone say they are cutting out gluten for health reasons? This episode talks all about whe...

It seems like in the healthcare setting we always hear “losing weight is healthy” and “gaining weight is unhealthy.” It seems like there is this thought that the best predictor of if someone is healthy is their weight and what number shows up on the scale. But the thing is, there are so many factors that come into play when it comes to the number on the scale. So many different things can impact i...

This episode is another episode in the Fresh Focus podcast’s Myth Busters series, where we are breaking down common nutrition myths and topics that seem to get spun by the media. This series’ hope is to give you an evidence-based place to go back to in between visits with your registered dietitian in order to get answers to your burning nutrition questions.    In this episode we talk all about met...