Certified Clinical Nutritionist

CCN’s Role in Nutrition
Certified Clinical Nutritionists (CCN’s) are a growing group of dedicated professionals who hold degrees in science and nutrition. CNN’s are required to pass a rigorous examination provided by the Clinical Nutrition Certification Board (CNCB), maintain 40 hours of continuing education every two years and be re-certified by examination every 5 years.
Certified Clinical Nutritionists offer their services in private practice or in collaboration with other licensed health care professionals who recognize that nutritional dysfunction is at the core of most illnesses today. As educators, researchers and authors, they provide training to professionals, and often enhance community awareness through lectures and other media venues.

Americans Suffer from Nutrition-Related Diseases
1) More than 1 in 2 Americans are overweight at a cost of 100 billion dollars per year in health costs due to diabetes, heart disease, colon cancer, etc.
2) Despite that, 50% of Americans are nutritionally deficient, especially those over age 55.
3) Changing your diet can increase your life span and help slow your aging process.

Diet vs. Nutrition
Diet is what one eats and drinks and nutrition is what happens inside the body as a result of what one eats and drinks.
Good nutrition happens when we provide ourselves with all the nutrients we need in adequate amounts and in a form the body can absorb and utilize. Much of what we need to achieve good nutrition is acquired from the food we eat, but increasingly, nutritional supplements are needed to keep us healthy in the midst of the stresses and circumstances of our lives, including environmental pollution, excessive food refinement, loss of sleep, exhaustion, emotional strain, dieting and illness.

The Role Nutrition Plays in Disease
Nutritional deficiency is one of the basic reasons for aging and disease. The Surgeon General’s Nutrition and Health Report of 1998 stated the 68% of all deaths (2-3 million per year) are nutrition related. Embracing good dietary and supplemental nutrition increases our chances of preventing or postponing many of the diseases that so negatively impact our quality of life such as heart disease, some cancers, diabetes, and others. Good nutritional support can often provide the foundation for successful treatment.
If you are not starving yourself, can you be nutritionally deficient? Yes! Sugar, to give an example, is an anti-nutrient; it robs the body of essential nutrients such as B vitamins and zinc and it also decreases the ability of your body’s immune system to function. As we age, our body’s ability to properly digest the food we eat decreases. It is recommended that anyone over the age of 55 take nutritional supplements because of this nutritional deficiency.

Nutrition Based Research
Consumers are benefiting from the exploding field of nutrition-based research. Scientists are increasing the study of the effects that nutrition has on many aspects of human health.
From nutrition research, we have learned the necessity of choosing whole (and wholesome) foods as well as the benefits of food supplements. We are identifying the role of nutrition in such seemingly unrelated problems as birth defects, stamina, heart disease, and mental illness. We are unveiling the role of substances not yet recognized as nutrients such as lipoic acid and conjugated linoleic acid, now found to benefit diabetes. The healing powers of certain fats and the detrimental effects of other fats are being defined.