Meal Plan of the Week: Simple Mediterranean

This week's meal plan of the week is for a 75-year-old lady who requested some help to lose weight and reduce her blood glucose levels and blood pressure

The details were as follows:

Age - 75

Weight - 88kg

Height - 161cm

BMI - 34kg/m2

Activity - Sedentary (physical limitations)

Preferred Meal Pattern - Breakfast, Dinner & 2 Snacks (No Lunch)

Dislikes/Allergies/Intolerances - Kiwi Fruit & Pineapple

Breakfast Instruction - 2 different breakfasts through the week, and 2 different breakfasts on the weekend.

Dinner Instruction - 3-4 dinners on repeat.

Snacks - Happy to repeat, but with 3-4 options for variety.

To help someone lose weight, I must first create a suitable calorie deficit based on that person's lifestyle.

✅We achieved this albeit only with a marginal calorie deficit given limitations with exercise.

If I'm creating a calorie deficit I also need to optimise protein to ensure the preservation of muscle.

✅ We achieved a little over 1g of protein per kg body weight. This is lower than what I would consider ideal, however, I have had to factor in this client's meal pattern, preferences and the suitability of higher protein options.

If I'm creating a calorie deficit and helping someone lose weight, my main focus is controlling hunger.

✅I focused on higher volume meals, fibre and protein to help control hunger. The snacks in this meal plan are quite satiating also.

To help someone improve their blood glucose control, I aim for under 100g of carbs per day, particularly lower-carb meals at night.

✅Humans are more insulin resistant at night and produce more insulin in the morning, hence why I recommend lower-carb meals at night. I was able to achieve this in this plan by locking all other meals, then unlocking the dinner meals and choosing the 'Low Carb' nutrition tag, before pressing 'Autogenerate.' This resulted in low-carb dinners for my client.

Regardless of the meal plan, I always aim to meet the Suggested Dietary Target for fibre (Women = 28g, Men = 38g).

✅This plan averaged out at 32g per day.

To reduce blood pressure, I aim to keep it under 1600mg per day.

✅This plan averaged out at 1057mg per day. This is too low, however, the client does like to add a sprinkle of salt at each meal. so I believe we have catered for this. The average sprinkle is estimated to be between 150-300mg of sodium.

If you'd like a meal plan like this for yourself or would like to create a plan for yourself (or your clients if you're a health professional), click on the appropriate link below.

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