8 Foods that Detox Your Arteries

05/16/2013

Overtime your arteries can begin to accumulate plaque and if you’re not careful, you may not even notice until the damage is done.

Heart disease can creep up on your body and so can the risk for heart attack or stroke too. Detoxing your arteries should be part of your daily ritual and can be acocmplished through a healthy diet. 

By making certain artery cleansing foods a part of your diet, you can keep your arteries running clean long into old age. Here are some heart healthy foods you should add to your grocery list:

1. Kiwi

Kiwis are loaded with flavonoids that cleanse your blood vessels and decrease inflammation. They're also loaded with fiber, which reduces cholestrol and reduces your risk of heart disease. 

2. Shrimp

While shrimp do have cholesterol, they also contain taurine, an amino acid which protects the arteries from fat crossing the intestinal wall. 

3. Avocado

Avocados have been shown to reduce total blood cholesterol by an average of 17 points. A compound called beta-sitosterol does the work. Cholesterol plays a big role in your arteries because high cholesterol levels build up plaque along the artery walls. Blood vessels can become blocked and even rupture, causing heart attack, stroke, and cardiovascular disease. 

4. Olive Oil

One of the polyphenols in olive oil, hydroxytyrosol, helps protect the cells that line your blood vessels from being damaged by overly reactive oxygen molecules. Therefore, it keeps the blood flowing through your arteries flowing strong. 

5. Asparagus 

Asparagus is one of the best, natural artery-clearing foods around, says Shane Ellison, an organic chemist and author of Over-The-Counter Natural Cures to Shape. "Asparagus works within the 100,000 miles of veins and arteries to release pressure, thereby allowing the body to accommodate for inflammation that has accumulated over the years." 

6. Sardines

Sardines have become all the rage as of late and that's a good thing considering that sardines are loaded with omega-3 fatty acids and niacin, both which are good for your heart. Add them to salads, dressings, or eat them with crackers.

7. Rolled Oats

Rolled oats contain beta-glucan, which lowers cholesterol and keeps plaque levels low in the arteries. Make homemade rolled oats with coconut milk, honey, nuts, and dried fruits. 

8. Watermelon

L-citrulline, an amino acid found in watermelon has been found to lower cholesterol because the body produces nitric oxide, which widens the blood vessels.

Photo: Digital Vision/Digital Vision/IStock

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Read More: Baldness a Signal of Heart Disease?

Should You Get a Colonic?

05/15/2013

A colonic is a proceedure that purges the colon of waste products as a sort of "cleansing" for the body.

Colonics were first used in the U.S. in the 1920’s and 1930’s but in the past few years they’ve become popular once again.

There are two types of colonics: 1) a gravity feed (where gravity does the work of pushing the water into your system) and 2) a pressured colonic (more intensely sprays water into your system). 

What to Expect at Your Colonic

When you go in for a colonic you’ll first fill out a patient history form with your colonic hydrotherapist. Then you’ll get into a gown and lie face down on the treatment table. A disposable speculum will be inserted into your anus, which is connected to a disposable plastic hose and then attached to a colon hydrotherapy unit.

Water is pushed into your body, causing the colon to contract and release feces through the hose. You may feel discomfort from the pressure of the water, but if you choose the less intense gravity feed, you may not. The hydrotherapist may massage your stomach to release additional feces. You can’t smell the feces but you can see it exiting the body through a tube. 

Are You a Good Candidate for a Colonic?

The purpose of a colonic is to remove accumulated waste and toxins as well as to relieve constipation. The theory of autointoxication is another reason why enthusiasts like colonics. The theory says that undigested meat and other foods can cause mucus buildup in the small intestine, releasing toxins into the entire body. This causes symptoms including fatigue, headache, weight gain, and a decrease in energy.

If you feel constipated and think you have these symptoms, this may be something to consider. While research on colonics is limited to this day, enthusiasts cite benefits including improved mental outlook, improved immunity, weight loss, and reduced risk of colon cancer.

But keep in the mind that without a colonic the body detoxes on its own through natural bacteria as well as through the liver, which neutralizes toxins on a daily basis. Mucus membranes in the colon keep unwanted substances from reentering the body and, additionally, the colon sheds cells every three days. 

Negative Side Effects

Negative side effects include vomiting, nausea, cramps, dizziness, dehydration, mineral imbalances, interference with medication absorption, bowel perforation, infection, and depletion of natural bowel flora. You can replenish natural bowel flora with probiotic supplements and by eating fermented, probiotic-rich foods. 

You shouldn’t get a colonic if you have ulcerative colitis, Crohn’s disease, hemorrhoids, congestive heart failure, heart disease, severe anemia, gastrointestinal cancer, recent colon surgery, intestinal tumors, or if you’re pregnant. 

Is a colonic right for you? You be the judge.

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Read More: Is colon cleansing a good idea?

Waist-to-Height Ratio More Important Than BMI

05/14/2013

Measuring the ratio of your waist to your height is a more accurate indicator of longevity than body mass index (BMI)--this according to researchers from Oxford Brookes University.

People with the highest waist-to-height ratio, of .8 and above, lived an average 17 fewer years than those with acceptable waist-to-height ratios, according to The Telegraph. 

Researchers found that in order to live optimally and reduce your risk of stroke, heart disease, and diabetes, you needed to keep your waist circumference at 1/2 of your height. This means at a height of 5'5'', your waist needs to stay below 33 inches in order for life expectancy not to be reduced. Children can be screened at ages as young as 5 years old.

In the study, researchers examined data from patients who had their waist-to-height ratios taken in the 1980’s. Twenty years later, death rates were more closely linked to waist-to-height ratios than BMI. They were even able to calculate longevity reductions based on waist-to-height ratios. 

Researcher Dr. Margaret Ashwell said to The Telegraph: "If you are measuring waist-to-height ratio you are getting a much earlier prediction that something is going wrong, and then you can do something about it.

"The beauty is that you can do it in centimetres or inches, it doesn't matter. We have got increasing evidence that this works very well with children as well, because whilst they grow up their waist is growing but also their height."

This is likely an indicator of the deadly nature of visceral fat. Visceral fat, located in the abdominal cavity, is the most dangerous kind of fat because it puts pressure on the body’s internal organs. It’s linked to an increased risk for cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes. In women, it’s associated with an increased risk of breast cancer. 

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Read More: 7 Foods Thin People Eat on a Daily Basis

Whole Foods Announces GMO Labeling By 2018

05/06/2013

GMO labeling has become a front and center issue. In November, voters in California narrowly defeated a ballot initiative requiring food manufacturers to label foods that include genetically modified ingredients. Proposition 37 was a California ballot initiative that would have required labeling on raw or processed food made with GMOs while prohibiting labeling or advertising of food as "natural" when it was made with GMOs.

Though Prop 37 was defeated, the furious lobbying efforts made by many food manufacturers may have backfired, making them look as if they were trying to falsely control the message. And today, the public is more and more in favor of clear labeling. It was this potent consumer demand that swayed Whole Foods Market President A.C Gallo to move toward full labeling of GMO ingredients by 2018. 

Consumer Demand

“We’ve seen how our customers have responded to the products we do have labeled,” Mr. Gallo said to The New York Times. “Some of our manufacturers say they’ve seen a 15 percent increase in sales of products they have labeled.”

Consumer demand and the 60 other countries already labeling GMO crops may have sent Whole Foods over the edge, but I think they’re may be even more to it. People spend the extra money at Whole Foods because they trust that they're ahead of the game. They're one of the first large scale grocers to highlight the importance of choosing USDA certified organic foods to avoid pesticide residue and the importance of buying dairy and meat free of hormones and antibiotics. 

People spend more money at Whole Foods because they believe them to be one of the few grocers that are ahead of the holistic health curve ball. They need profit of course, but consumers want to believe that the grocer doesn’t put it above the health of their consumers.  

The GMO Picture

Today, 93 percent of all soy, 86 percent of corn, and 93 percent of canola seeds are genetically modified. Soy, corn, and canola are in so many of the processed foods we eat everyday, they're difficult to avoid. Consumers that are concerned with avoiding GMOs for health and environmental concerns are often willing to pay more to find these products.

This isn’t the first GMO labeling at the store. Whole Foods has many of its 365 Everyday Value Products certified by the NON GMO Project. The NON GMO Project scientifically tests all of the individual ingredients that make up a product using a third party testing facility. 

Gary Hirshberg from Just Label It, calls this a game changer. “We’ve had some pretty big developments in labeling this year,” Mr. Hirshberg said to The New York Times, adding that 22 states now have some sort of pending labeling legislation. “Now, one of the fastest-growing, most successful retailers in the country is throwing down the gantlet.”

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Read More: Are We Ready For Genetically Engineered Fish?

7 Reasons Why More Kids are Allergic

05/04/2013

Research shows that more kids than ever before have allergies and I don’t mean a sniffly nose or a rash, I mean seriously debilitating allergies that are in many cases, deadly.

Of the 40,000 families surveyed, 8 percent have food allergies of some sort, according to Dr. Ruchi Gupta, of Children's Memorial Hospital and an associate professor of pediatrics at Northwestern University's School of Medicine on PBS. 

Of those with allergies, 37 percent have severe or life threatening allergies and 30 percent have sensitivities to more than one food group. Researchers looked at the type of food allergy, the type of reaction, and how the allergy was diagnosed. 

The most common food allergy was to peanuts, followed by milk and shellfish. Many were highly allergic, meaning that they would react to even touching a food. Why are more kids than ever before allergic to peanuts, soy, shellfish, milk, and so many more food products? Why do so many children have asthma? Researchers still have a lot of work to do, but these are some of the reasons that doctors point to in their quest to figure out why childhood allergies have become so severe and so prevalent.

1. The Hygiene Hypothesis 

We are too clean. In fact, the sterile environments we put our kids in mean their immune systems don’t come in contact with allergens so their bodies aren’t able to fight them. Modern life may be too clean; we don’t live on farms and we’re never in touch with dirt. And we love antibacterial everything. 

"We’ve developed a cleanlier lifestyle, and our bodies no longer need to fight germs as much as they did in the past," said Marc McMorris, a pediatric allergist at the University of Michigan Health System. "As a result, the immune system has shifted away from fighting infection to developing more allergic tendencies."

2. The Western Diet

There may also be a connection to the Western Diet. Additives and pesticides may be changing our gut flora so that our bodies can no longer handle certain foods, creating sensitivity, both mild and severe. Junk food may also contribute to childhood asthma.

3. GMOs in Our Diet

According to The Unhealthy Truth, by Robyn O’Brien, allergies are an overreaction to a protein in the body so that the immune system reads foods as foreign and dangerous. Today, 93 percent of all soy, 86 percent of corn, and 93 percent of canola seeds are now genetically modified. But it's not just that so many foods are modified (165 million acres and counting), it's that there's currently no labeling system in place so that consumers know what they're buying. Soy, corn, and canola are in so many of the processed foods we eat everyday, they're difficult to avoid and may be causing our immune systems to work overtime, reading these foods as foreign and dangerous.

4. New Milk Proteins 

As I said above, milk is the number two food allergy because new proteins have been added to our milk supply, making more children than ever before unable to digest it. 

5. Chemical Cleaners 

One of the requests that doctors dealing with childhood asthma will make is that parents stop using toxic chemical cleaners and replace them with natural cleaners like vinegar and baking soda. This is because childhood asthma can be set off with strong cleaners. Bleach, ammonia, and antibacterial cleaners may do damage to a child’s respiratory system. 

 6. Food Avoidance

Nervous parents may avoid these foods, making the problem even worse. A research team from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, found that maternal intake of peanuts in mice can bring about protection against peanut allergies in offspring. Further, breast feeding can help matters. According to Food Navigator:

"[M]aternal transmission of these peanut-specific antibodies through breast milk may be, at least in part, responsible for this protection."

7. C-Sections

Babies born through c-sections may have different immune systems. According to the National Institutes of Health, "Researchers evaluated more than 1,200 newborns when they were 1 month, 6 months, 1 year and 2 years old. By age 2, babies born by cesarean section were five times more likely to have allergies than those born naturally when exposed to high levels of common household allergens such as pet dander and dust mites."

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Read More: Eating Peanuts During Pregnancy Could Reduce the Deadly Allergy in Your Baby

Half of Ground Turkey Samples Test Positive for Fecal Bacteria

05/03/2013

The first ever lab analysis of ground turkey has brought some scary realities to light, according to research from Consumer Reports.

Researchers studied 257 samples from retailers nationwide and found that more than half tested positive for fecal bacteria.

Specifically, 69 percent of ground turkey samples had enterococcus and 60 percent had e coli, bacteria associated with fecal matter. Additionally, some of the samples tested positive for salmonella and staphylococcus aureus, the two leading causes of food borne illness. 

Ninety percent of the samples had one or more of the five bacteria Consumer Reports tested for in the study. But the scariest part of the study wasn’t the bacteria itself, but that many of the bacteria were antibiotic resistant, meaning they could not be treated with three or more common antibiotics. Three of the samples had antibiotic resistant staphylococcus, which is known to be deadly. 

Use of Antibiotics Tied to Resistance

The only positive news, if you want to call it that, was that products labeled “organic,” “no antibiotics,” and “raised without antibiotics” had much fewer antibiotic resistant bacteria, though there was still bacteria in their products. 

Livestock free of antibiotics are much less likely to carry resistant bacteria. In conventional livestock, the use of antibiotics is under fire because scientists are finding that it causes the perfect breeding ground for drug resistant bacteria. This is particularly true of the subtherapeutic use of antibiotics, meaning using them for any use other than sickness, including fattening livestock up rapidly or to quell any sickness caused by cruel treatment or unhealthy living standards that could cause them to get sick in the future.

The problem is getting worse. Last year an antibiotic resistant salmonella strain caused the recall of nearly 55,000 pounds of frozen raw turkey burgers. 

If you’re going to eat meat, make sure you buy organic. Organic livestock is free of antibiotics, growth-promoting hormones, the feed must be certified organic, and animals must have free range to roam. 

Photo: Ingram Publishing 

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Read More: House Passes Huge Cuts to Food Safety

5 Ways To Get More Fiber and Digest It Properly!

04/27/2013

I like to call it ruffage, the fibrous portion of certain foods that serve as miniature scrubbers for the intestinal walls. Just like you need to spend ample time each week cleaning your house in order for it to be livable and healthy, you need to eat enough ruffage to give your insides a good scrub down each and every day. 

How much fiber do you really need? The number varies based on your age and sex.

-Men under 50, 38 grams per day
-Men over 50, 30 grams per day
-Women under 50, 25 grams per day
-Women over 50, 21 grams per day

Looking for easy ways to add fiber to your diet each and every day?

Here are 5 tips for adding fiber to your diet: 

1. Add berries, banana, apples, or kiwi to your morning cereal, oats, or as a side at lunch.
2. Switch processed oatmeal to steel cut oats.
3. Add in beans.  
4. Top dishes with flax or sesame seeds.
5. Add avocado as a topper to meals.

The idea of adding fiber is a good start, but if the body has trouble digesting it than it does little good. Ideally, you want foods to properly move through your system.

Here are 5 tips for digesting all the new fiber you’ve added in:

1. Ease more fiber into your diet. 

Don’t go from 14 grams to 38 grams in a day’s time; it will make you feel gassy or bloated. Gradually begin to do one thing on the list a week. Within time you’ll be doing all five.

 2. Soak beans. 

Soaking beans makes them easier to digest. Soak dried beans for 4 hours before you begin to cook them. Not only does it make them easier to digest, it reduces the cooking time. Each week cook some dried beans so that you have them for the week ahead. This way you can easily add them to soups, salads, rice, or quinoa. Navy, white, and yellow beans have the most fiber.

3. Chew Slowly. 

The way your food is digested has a lot to do with how you chew. Take time to consciously chew your food before you swallow.

4. Exercise.

Exercise removes bloat and gets your system running smoothly. You may notice that you have to go to the bathroom after a run or after a yoga class because both are good for digestion.

5. Try Probiotics.

Consider adding a probiotic into your diet. It may be that your digestion needs a little bacterial push in the right direction. 

Photo: Istock

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Read More: Stop Drinking Water With Meals--Seriously

Doctors Warn Teens: "Don’t Take 'The Cinnamon Challenge'”

04/23/2013

It seemed like a playful YouTube challenge that was all in good fun but the dangerous prank has led to a slew of kids being hospitalized or sent to poison control centers nationwide. 

Doctors are warning kids and teens alike not to take “The Cinnamon Challenge.” The fad dares kids to swallow a spoonful of cinnamon in 60 seconds without any water. But the challenge can cause choking, throat irritation, breathing problems, and a malfunctioning of the lungs, according to a report published in the journal Pediatrics.

Thirty teens nationwide needed medical attention after taking the challenge and trips to poison control centers have gone from 51 to 222 visits in the last year. People with asthma or other respiratory problems are at a greater risk of a reaction. 

The Washington Post reports:

Thousands of YouTube videos depict kids attempting the challenge, resulting in an “orange burst of dragon breath” spewing out of their mouths and sometimes hysterical laughter from friends watching the stunt, said report co-author Dr. Steven E. Lipshultz, a pediatrics professor at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine.

But the challenge is no joke considering that it can cause scarring in the lungs amongst other side effects. 

The New York Times reports that "Google recorded 2.4 million hits for the topic in 2012, up from 200,000 in 2009. A Web site devoted to the challenge claims that more than 40,000 videos have been posted on YouTube..."

Dejah Reed, 16 took the challenge four times and on the fourth time she started laughing and then began to choke. Her father came in and noticed the she had turned “a pale bluish color. It was very terrifying. I threw her over my shoulder” and drove to a nearby emergency room, reported on The Washington Post. 

It’s a YouTube phenomenon gone terribly wrong. Parents and teens should be aware that this is no joke, but rather, it's a dangerous proposition.

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Read More: Doctors Afraid to Tell Parents That Their Kids are Overweight

20 Foods that Lower Blood Pressure

04/21/2013

High blood pressure is one of leading risk factors for cardiovascular disease, heart failure, stroke, and kidney failure.

Blood pressure refers to the pushing of blood against artery walls, and if this remains high overtime it can cause serious damage to the body's organs.

About 1 in 3 American adults have high blood pressure. Here are the numbers: Normal blood pressure is up to 120/80, prehypertension (pre-high blood pressure) is 120-139/80-89, and high blood pressure is anything above 140/90. 

Ninety percent of indviduals above the age of 55 develop high blood pressure during their lifetime. 

You can reduce your blood pressure by cutting your salt intake by just 1 teaspoon per day (this includes sodium in processed foods), reducing caffeine consumption, exercising daily, losing weight, reducing stress, reducing alcohol intake, adding in potassium, and adding in vitamin D.

Since diet is your daily medicine, why not adopt a diet that helps to reduce your blood pressure? Here are 20 foods that lower blood pressure. 

Vegetables

1. Dark Leafy Greens

2. Potatoes 

3. Beets

4. Chili Peppers

5. Tomatoes (though technically a fruit, used in more savory vegetable dishes)

6. Garlic  

7. Onion

Fruits 

8. Raisins 

9. Bananas

10. Watermelon

11. Berries  

12. Grapes

13. Oranges

14. Kiwi

15. Grapefruit

Seeds/Legumes

16. Beans

17. Flax Seeds 

Other 

18. Dark Chocolate

19. Olive Oil 

20. Rolled Oats 

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Read More: The Largest Indicator of Lifespan is...

Bubble Tea Tapioca Balls May Be Carcinogenic

04/20/2013

It’s a kitchy trend in the U.S. that started in Taiwan in the 1980’s.

Bubble tea, often called boba tea, milk tea, or pearl tea is a mix of tea, milk, sugar, and giant black tapioca balls (about the size of a small marble). It comes with an extra wide straw to slurp up the sweet, chewy balls. But new research out of Germany’s University of Aachen has found traces of PCBs in the famous tapioca balls, according to The Huffington Post. 

The samples, which came from an unnamed chain in Northwest Germany and were sourced from a Taiwanese producer, contained PCBs. PCBs are a group of chemicals that were banned in the U.S. in 1979 because, according to the EPA, “clear evidence showed that the PCBs cause cancer in animals.”

PCBs have also been linked to other health problems related to immune, endocrine, reproductive, and nervous system function.

"[What we found] includes in particular styrene, acetophenone, and brominated substances that shouldn't be in food at all," scientist Manfred Möller, of the Institute of Hygiene and Environmental Medicine at the University Hospital Aachen, told German newspaper The Local, notes the AFP.

A leading Taiwanese drink manufacturer, along with the equivalent of the Taiwanese FDA have disputed the study.

Researchers also identified choking hazards with the tapioca balls, which isn’t terribly unexpected. 

"Especially with children aged up to four years, there is a risk of foreign objects accidentally entering the lungs," said Dr. Andreas Hensel in a press release on the Institute's website, reported on The Huffington Post. "And that is precisely what can happen when the bubbles are sucked up through a straw."

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