Make Every Bite Count

by nurses & health

Every living things including man needs food to survive. Adequate Nutrition is one of the keys to healthy life. Dietary plans is as important as exercise. Weight, person’s age, height, sex, and level of physical activities are among the factors that affect how many calorie one should consume.
In order to make every bite count, the following are few tips you can adopt.
  1. Ensue a healthy dietary pattern at every stage in life.Build nutrient-dense food and beverages choices to suit personal preferences, cultural traditions and budgets.
  2. Focus on meeting dietary needs from this five groups of food- vegetables, fruits, grains, diary, proteins and limit calorie intake (stay within the limit).
  3. Decrease the intake of food and beverages that are higher in sugars, saturated fats, sodium (salt) and limit alcoholic drinks/beverages.
  4. Build nutrient-dense food and beverages choices to suit personal preferences, cultural traditions and budgets.Focus on meeting dietary needs from this five groups of food- vegetables, fruits, grains, diary, proteins and limit calorie intake (stay within the limit).Decrease the intake of food and beverages that are higher in sugars, saturated fats, sodium (salt) and limit alcoholic drinks/beverages.


Guidance for Infant and Toddlers


Infant should receive exclusive breast milk for the first 6 months of life. This should be continued through at least 1 year and longer if the mother desire. At the 7th month, infants should be introduced to variety of nutrient dense complementary foods, which include iron, zinc, calcium, proteins, and supplemental vitamin D especially if they are exclusively breast fed.

For all ages

From 12 months through older adulthood, people should maintain a healthy dietary pattern to meet nutrient needs, achieve a healthy body weight and decrease the risk of chronic diseases like Hypertension, Cancers, Liver diseases etc.

The core elements of healthy diets includes

  • Vegetables of all kinds (dark green, lentils starchy vegetables etc.).
  • Fruits, especially whole fruits.
  • Grains, of which half should be whole grains.
  • Dairy- fat free or low fat milk, yoghurt & cheese, fortified soy beverages.
  • Protein foods including, beans, peas, lean meats, poultry (eggs), sea food (crabs, fish), nuts (groundnut), seeds (melon), and soy products.
  • Oils including vegetable oils palm oil and oils in food such as sea foods and nuts.
    • There is limit to added sugars, sodium, saturated fat and alcohol intake. Added sugars of less than 10% of calorie per day starts at age 2 years.  Before the age of 2 years, foods and beverages with added sugars should be avoided.
    At age 2 years, saturated fat should be limited to less than 10% of calorie per day and sodium intake should be limited to 1200mg per day, 1500mg per day for age 4-8 years, 1800mg per day for children 9-13 years of age and 2800mg per day for those age  14 years and older.

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