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When changing eating habits, limiting sweets and salty snacks, as well as adding physical activity do not help to lose extra pounds, it is useful to precisely determine your energy needs and then estimate how many calories you should actually take in during the day to achieve your goal. Only providing fewer kilocalories than the body spends during the day will bring us closer to our dream figure.
How to calculate your demand?
The basis for calculating calorie needs is to determine our total energy expenditure during the day. In order to calculate the Total Metabolism (CPM), we should first calculate the Basal Metabolism (PPM) and then multiply it by the appropriate physical activity factor. So:
Total Metabolism (CPM) = Basal Metabolism (PPM) x Physical Activity Factor
And now let's explain what the individual elements are. PPM is the lowest level of energy changes occurring in the human body. The energy from PPM is used to maintain basic life processes, such as breathing, blood circulation or the work of the heart. Harris-Benedict or Mifflin formulas can be used to calculate PPM.
Mifflin's formula:
- PPM (women) = (10 x body weight [kg]) + (6.25 x height [cm]) - (5 x [age]) — 161
- PPM (men) = (10 x body weight [kg]) + (6.25 x height [cm]) - (5 x [age]) + 5
Harris-Benedict formula:
- PPM (women) = 655.1 + (9.563 x body weight [kg]) + (1.85 x height [cm]) — (4.676 x [age])
- PPM (men) = 66.5+ (13.75 x body weight [kg]) + (5.003 x height [cm]) — (6.775 x [age])
And what is physical activity? Contrary to appearances, this concept does not only hide workouts in the gym or playing sports. Physical activity is also a walk, climbing stairs and even household cleaning - we also lose calories on them!
The following activity coefficients are assumed:
- 1,2 — 1,3 —> for a bedridden patient
- 1,4 —> for low physical activity
- 1.6 —> for moderate physical activity
- 1.75 —> active lifestyle
- 2 —> very active lifestyle
- 2.2-2.4 —> competitive sports
Caloric content of the diet depends on the goal
Once the CPM has been calculated, it is necessary to make a modification of the caloric content of our nutritional plan depending on the objective assumed. If you want to increase body weight or build muscle mass, we add the right number of calories to the CPM. Often it is about 200-300 kcal per day more. We do the opposite when we want to reduce body weight. Then you should subtract some calories from the CPM, depending on the starting weight and the physical activity practiced. It is usually recommended to “cut off” approx. 300-600 kcal, and in the case of obese people up to 1000 kcal per day. Another assumption may be to reduce the CPM value by 10-20%.
But beware! The potential end effect is not worth concluding after the first weeks of the diet, when the weight reduction is definitely greater. Weight loss should be gradual and stable (this usually happens only at the next stage of weight loss), and the decrease should be about 0.5-1 kg/week. It also happens that the decrease in weight is not noticeable on the scale, but definitely visible when taking measurements of the circumference of a part of the body (eg thigh, calf, waist or abdomen).
Confirmation of a specialist
In order for the diet to bring the intended goal, the calorie content of the plan should be calculated individually. While using the above formulas should not be a big problem, estimating the appropriate level of activity can cause doubts, as well as introduce a significant error in the calculations. It is therefore always worth consulting your need with an experienced nutritionist.
Bibliography:
- Gawęcki J. (ed.): Human nutrition, the basics of nutrition science. PWN Scientific Publishing House, Warsaw,2012
- Jarosz M., Rychlik E., Stoś K., Charzewska J. (eds.): Nutrition standards for the Polish population and their application. National Institute of Public Health - State Department of Hygiene, 2020
- Bean A.: Nutrition in sports, a complete guide. Ed. Profit and S-ka, 2014
