SEVERAL days into the New Year, and the chances are that many well-intentioned resolutions regarding getter healthier and fitter will have already fallen by the wayside. But not everyone sees starting January 1 as the key to beginning to change their lifestyle - and when you are right and ready, there's plenty of advice and support to be had.

THE road to health is paved with good intentions - and many of these begin with the ringing of the bell to signal the start of the New Year.

Sadly, by now, lots of people will have abandoned their attempts at stopping smoking, or cutting their alcohol intake, or losing weight, or will have given up on plans to hit the gym, or to run, cycle, or generally get more exercise.

For every person who manages to make good on a New Year resolution, there will be several who do not. But not every lifestyle change has to start on January 1 - and given the heightened and celebratory mood that tends to proliferate around this landmark date, it is probably better for many of us to leave it for a few days.

The key advantage for people wanting to improve their health and wellbeing is that there is no shortage of advice and support out there. But where to start?

It will pay to decide first of all what it is you want to do to improve your health, be it cutting out smoking, stopping or reducing alcohol intake, eating more healthily, or a combination of these.

Set up in 2010, Change4Life is an initiative running across England and Wales that seeks to encourage people of all ages to get more active. More than one million people have signed up, including more than 40,000 in Wales.

The website at www.change4lifewales.org.uk pulls off the difficult trick of being informative without blinding with science. It is currently focusing on alcohol consumption under the banner 'your liver needs a break'.

But there is also plenty of advice about walking and other activities, and healthy eating, including lots of recipes.

Another Wales initiative is also good for advice and information on healthy lifestyles.

Health Challenge Wales - www.healthchallengewales.org - is like Change4Life, backed by the Welsh Government and is a little more formal with a wider focus that takes in issues such as immunisation and how avoid accidents.

But it also contains excellent sections on food and fitness, and alcohol and drugs, and is strong on links to other organisations and support groups.

On the specific subject of alcohol, two similar initiatives are running at the moment: Dry January, co-ordinated by Alcohol Concern - www.dryjanuary.org.uk - and Cancer Research UK's Dryathlon campaign (see www.cancerresearchuk.org/support-us/find-an-event/charity-challenges/dryathlon).

Both have a fundraising element, but are valuable in their own right as challenges for those looking to give up or cut down their alcohol intake. The websites for these campaigns also contain advice on information on subjects as alcohol units.

And handily, their launch has coincided with the publication of a study from University College London Medical School and the journal New Scientist, which claims that avoiding alcohol for just one month could lead to a reversal of liver damage, improved brain function and weight loss.

Many people will have embarked on, or are proposing to embark on, diets of various kinds and again there is plenty of advice and support available out there, with slimming clubs that can be joined, or individual weight loss programmes to be pursued.

A lot of these are target weight-driven, structured dieting programmes, while others focus more on the healthy eating aspect of weight loss, for those who prefer to try it their own way.

As ever too, there are a host of clubs and groups out there running specific programmes such as yoga and keep fit-based exercise, and activities such as swimming can be enjoyed within having to travel too far or hit the pocket hard.

Much has been written or spoken - and will continue to be - about issues such as obesity, smoking, poor diet and their effect on individual health and the wider wellbeing of the population.

Report after report, and action plan after action plan have emphasised the need for individuals to take more responsibility for their health and wellbeing, to ease the burden on the NHS.

Untold numbers make that individual effort, and find their own ways of doing so, one of the most important things being to decide a method and if necessary, a timescale, that works for them.