All of us want to live a long life, but none of us want to think about the chronic illnesses that often accompany longevity. The trick is to first stay healthy and then live a long time.
And it's never too early to protect yourself from common degenerative illnesses like heart disease and deteriorating eyesight. Especially when there's a single food that can help you stay well.
If you're trying to lose weight, chances are you have cut this food out of your diet completely. If your digestion isn't what it used to be, you may have stopped eating it as well. If so, I'd like you to look again more closely at its benefits. They far outweigh any disadvantages.
This is a food that reduces inflammation, lowers your risk for heart disease, and slows the progression of macular degeneration. I'm not talking about an expensive antioxidant-rich fruit juice or powdered algae. I'm talking about something you can find in every supermarket, and they're affordable. I'm talking about nuts.
Fresh raw nuts are packed with healthy mono- and polyunsaturated oils, vitamin E, and other beneficial nutrients. Don't be afraid that you'll gain weight if you eat them. If you replace other dietary fats with nuts, you shouldn't gain an ounce.
Nuts reduce inflammation
I've talked a great deal about inflammation in the past, and how it's at the root of so many diseases. Heart disease, diabetes, and every condition that ends in "itis" — like arthritis, bronchitis, hepatitis, and psoriasis — are all inflammatory conditions. Please check my website to read these articles. They'll explain the importance of reducing inflammation to protect against a host of health problems. Of all the solutions I've ever mentioned for inflammation, none are as inexpensive or as available as nuts and seeds.
Recently, a number of new studies that support the use of nuts to reduce inflammation crossed my desk. They caused me to take an even closer look at them than before. The first study found that people who regularly eat nuts and seeds have lower inflammatory markers, such as c-reactive protein, interleukin-6 (an immune protein associated with inflammation), and fibrinogen.
Nuts can lower fibrinogen? This is huge. Read my articles on fibrinogen and you'll be excited about this as well.
Nuts protect your heart
Next, I looked at a large analysis of 23 studies and over 400 publications. This article found that all nuts, except macadamias, reduced total cholesterol and LDL cholesterol. How much did people have to eat to get this protection? Not much at all. Participants ate from two to four ounces of nuts a day for five days a week. One ounce is approximately two tablespoons — a good amount for an afternoon or evening snack.
You may not need to eat even this much. A large nurses' study found that substituting the fat from one ounce of nuts for carbohydrates lowered a person's risk for heart disease by 30%. When nut fats were substituted for saturated (animal) fat, the risk was lowered to 45%! You can almost cut your risk for heart disease in half by eating less meat and more nuts. Just like meat, eating nuts makes you feel full and satisfied because of its fat content. A small amount of nuts can alleviate your hunger for hours.
But there's more.
Atherosclerosis is a buildup of fatty deposits in the arteries of the heart. As they narrow and harden the blood vessels, less oxygen is able to get to the heart. This condition is called ischemic heart disease (IHD). A large study of Seventh-day Adventists (vegetarians) found that the more nuts they ate, the less frequently they had heart attacks or died from IHD.
This finding surprised the researchers at Loma Linda University, who called it "one of the most unexpected and novel findings in nutritional epidemiology in the past five years." This protection was not limited to vegetarians. In other studies of whites, blacks, and the elderly, death from any cause was lowest in the people who ate the most nuts.
Nuts protect your eyes
My mother and uncle both had advanced macular degeneration (AMD). It led to my uncle's blindness and impaired my mother's vision so she could no longer read. Was their macular degeneration caused by genetics? Is this what I have to look forward to? Or can my diet help prevent this progressive and incurable eye disease, the leading cause of blindness as we age? Based on a number of scientific studies, I'm confident that I can beat this disease. I think you can, too.
You can imagine how relieved I was to read a study that followed over 250 people over the age of 60 with early signs of AMD for more than four-and-a-half years. It took a close look at all types of dietary fats. The results showed that the total amount of fat a person eats is directly associated with the risk of progression from early to advanced AMD.
Eating animal fat doubled the risk of progression over eating vegetable oils. So did eating the fats found in processed baked goods — daily desserts that my mother and uncle both enjoyed throughout their lives.
The only fats that reduced the progression of AMD were fish oils and nuts. Protect your eyes now by reducing animal fats in your diet and adding nuts. But please make sure that they're fresh and stored correctly to protect their oils.
Eat only fresh nuts
Make sure that the nuts you buy are fresh. Stale, moldy nuts are more harmful than beneficial. Here are some potential problems and simple solutions.
Nut oils can become rancid. Nuts have hard shells to protect their oils from getting rancid. The harder the shell, the more fragile its oil. Light and heat increase rancidity, which begins as soon as the nuts are shelled. Even vacuum-packed nuts deteriorate over time. Either buy nuts in the shell — they'll last up to a year — or buy small quantities and store them in your freezer.
Nuts can become moldy. All nuts, seeds, and grains are subject to molds like aflatoxin. However, you have to eat huge quantities of molds before you reach toxic levels. In large quantities, aflatoxin can contribute to liver cancer. It's difficult to eat enough nuts with molds to cause damage.
In a recent study, 100 people were asked to crack and sort Brazil nuts, looking for those that they considered inedible due to molds. Without exception, the participants were able to tell good from moldy nuts. If any of the nuts you're about to eat look like they have just a little bit of mold on them, take my advice: Throw them out.
Nuts can feed some viruses. Nuts are high in the amino acid l-arginine. L-arginine is necessary for the particular herpes viruses that cause cold sores and genital herpes to grow and spread. If you have herpes, or are prone to getting frequent outbreaks, keep your intake of nuts low. One ounce of nuts a day, enough to protect your heart, should not trigger a herpes outbreak.
Nuts can be hard to digest. Too much fat of any kind can foul up your digestion and elimination. Although nuts are high in beneficial fats, all fats can be difficult to digest — especially as we get older. Two keys to increasing their digestibility are: eat small quantities and chew them well.
Jiang, R., et al. "Nut and seed consumption and inflammatory markers in the multi-ethnic study of atherosclerosis," Am J Epidemiol, December 15, 2005.
Kris-Etherton, P.M., et al. "Nuts and their bioactive constituents: effects on serum lipids and other factors that affect disease risk," Am J Clin Nutr, September 1999.
Marklinder, I., et al. "Consumers' ability to discriminate aflatoxin-contaminated Brazil nuts," Food Additives &a Contaminants, January 2005.
Sabate, J., "Nut consumption, vegetarian diets, ischemic heart disease risk, and all-cause mortality: evidence from epidemiologic studies," Am J Clin Nutr, September 1999.
A Simple Way to Lower Your Blood Pressure
If you have high blood pressure, you're at an increased risk for having a heart attack or stroke. This is why so many doctors give their patients with high blood pressure various medications. They save lives. But pills are not the only answer.
A vegetarian diet, low sodium intake, and numerous nutrients I've talked about in past articles also help lower blood pressure. There's also a no-cost therapy that works, as well. I'm hoping I can encourage you to include it into your daily health plan — starting right now.
What do I mean by a daily health plan? The steps each of us needs to take each day to either get or stay healthy. As time passes, it takes more time and effort to maintain our health. Many people opt for more pills. With the rising cost of prescription drugs, and their side effects, I suggest that you do everything else first. Then, if you need a drug, take it.
When is your blood pressure too high?
Normal blood pressure is around 120/80. Mild hypertension would be 140-160/95-104. Moderate is 140-180/105-114. And if your blood pressure skyrockets to more than 160/over more than 115, your doctor is probably reaching for his or her prescription pad.
Diet and stress are two major causes of hypertension. A low-sodium diet high in vegetables and low in animal protein is a healthy way to keep your blood pressure low. As we get older, our health tends to decline and we worry more. This is where stress-reduction techniques, such as relaxation exercises, yoga, deep breathing, and hypnosis, become essential. But don't overlook a simple, effective way to lower your blood pressure and keep it low: exercise.
Get enough of the right kind of exercise.
I go to the gym five days a week. Three days a week, I take two one-hour exercise classes back-to-back. Several of them are cardiovascular classes that keep my heart strong. The other two days I take a one-hour class and walk on the treadmill for 45-60 minutes.
I know. This is a lot of exercise. But I do it because all of this keeps me flexible, helps my balance, strengthens my heart and lungs, and keeps my blood pressure low. However, you don't have to do this much exercise to reduce your hypertension!
In fact, you don't even have to exercise every day. Studies show that moderate exercise is enough to lower blood pressure.
A 30-minute walk — more than a stroll, but less than a brisk walk — can reduce your blood pressure for the next 24 hours. But wait. It gets better than this. If you walk for three days in a row, your blood pressure will usually fall for an even longer period of time. This effect won't last, of course. After a week or two of not exercising, your blood pressure will rise again to your pre-exercise level. There's no way around it. We all need to move more for good circulation, stress reduction, and a healthy heart.
Regular moderate exercise lowers blood pressure in 75% of hypertensive people. In addition, it reduces your risk for heart disease by at least 25%. If you've been a couch potato, you need to know that a little exercise goes a long, long way. It's not necessary to go from being sedentary to becoming an exercise fanatic.
Which would you say is more effective for lowering blood pressure: walking for half an hour, three days a week or walking briskly for an hour, two times a week like I do? I'll bet you guessed wrong. There's actually not much difference between the two. If you walk three days a week, every week, you can reduce your hypertension.
Of course, there are other advantages for exercising more frequently, like better muscle tone and weight control. But if you're just looking to lower your blood pressure, make a commitment to exercise for half an hour on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.
The best exercises for hypertension
Walking, jogging, and cycling have been found to be three of the most effective types of exercise for blood pressure control.
Jogging, however, is hard on the knees and I don't advise it if you haven't exercised much in the past. Of the three, cycling has been found to be the most effective, according to a study in the Annals of Internal Medicine (2002). This includes using an exercise bike, so you may want to get one and work out in the comfort of your home.
If you'd rather walk, and the weather is too cold or rainy, remember that malls can be used for exercise, not just for shopping. Some malls even have walking programs you can join so you don't have to exercise alone.
Whatever you decide to do, just push yourself to do it. Years ago, I read a magazine article about a world-class runner. She was asked what was the most difficult part of her training program. "Putting my shoes on in the morning," she said.
So here's a suggestion that has worked for me. Put your exercise clothes and shoes in a prominent place so you see them first thing in the morning. Then put them on, no matter what time you're planning to walk or cycle.
Eventually you will find it's easier to be motivated to exercise because you'll feel more relaxed afterward. After I've been exercising for about 20 minutes on a bike or treadmill, I notice that any stress I may have had when I began seems to melt away. I predict that you'll experience this, too. Of course, you can always take a blood pressure-lowering medication and hope you don't get any of its nasty side effects. But drugs may not be necessary. This solution to hypertension costs nothing but an hour-and-a-half a week.
Elley, C.R., and B. Arroll. "Refining the exercise prescription for hypertension," The Lancet, October 8, 2005.
Murray, M., ND and J. Pizzorno, ND. Encyclopedia of Natural Medicine, Prima Publishing, 1998.
Richard, C. and M. Jurgens. "Effects of natural health products on blood pressure," Annals of Pharmacotherapy, 2005.
Are Any Breast Implants Safe?
Breast implants are not only used to enhance the size of a woman's breast. They also are used to reconstruct breasts after breast cancer surgery. This is why the issue of their safety is so important. The FDA has already taken some implants off the market after questions of their safety surfaced.
A number of women with implants have been awarded millions of dollars after coming down with autoimmune and connective tissue diseases. Still, many scientific studies insist that they're safe. What's the truth about silicone breast implants? And if they're not safe, are saline implants any safer?
Perhaps the latest talk out of Canada can begin to help clear up the confusion. While numerous studies found no definitive connections between silicone implants and disease, the people at Health Canada believe there's a reason for that. The studies were too small and too short.
You'd think that before anyone could legally place anything containing materials foreign to our bodies inside us, the substance would have to pass vigorous tests. Well, this never happened with silicone implants. They first came on the market in the early 1960s and were never required to meet government regulations for safety and effectiveness. Silicone was assumed to be biologically inactive and, thus, unable to cause any harm. And manufacturers were not required to provide studies showing that they were safe unless questions about their safety arose.
Thirty years later, there were enough questions to pull silicone implants off the market. During these 30 years, some women with implants got sick.
And now there's almost a revolving door for implant surgeries. In 2003, almost 255,000 women had breast enhancement implant surgeries – twice as many as in 1998. One-sixth of them had their implants removed. Another 68,000 women had implants for breast reconstruction. More than one-fourth of them had their implants removed. We don't know why.
Before silicone implants can be sold, they need pre-market approval. Two years ago, the FDA ruled that the new implants weren't approvable. There are too many unanswered questions. For instance, you can run a truck over an implant and it won't burst. But no one knows how quickly the implant's silicone envelope will deteriorate when it's inside a woman's body.
Breast implants mean several surgeries
Even the FDA admits that one surgery isn't usually enough. If you have implants of any kind, they'll need to be replaced at some point. Here are some reasons why. The scar tissue that forms around an implant may tighten and cause some breast tissue to get harder. This is called "capsular contracture" and can cause the skin to ripple and change the shape of your breast. This tightening can be both disfiguring and painful.
Another reason, one that you may fail to consider, is that implants can rupture at any time. The silicone within an implant is thicker than saline, so if you have a silicone implant you may not know if and when it leaks. You may not see or feel anything different unless most of the silicone seeps out.
Of course, a mammogram that squeezes your breasts could contribute to ruptures, especially when implants are older and the silicone envelope has been compromised. And mammograms are not always effective when you have implants. The implants can hide tumors. Both calcium deposits that often surround the implants and scar tissue, can look like cancer on a mammogram.
Implants of any kind can result in temporary or permanent nerve damage. And, of course, it's possible for your implant to shift out of position.
A better option
There is another option for breast reconstruction. Skin, fat, and tiny blood vessels can be transferred from your tummy, buttocks, or under your arm and reconstructed into natural-looking breasts. If you're considering an implant, talk first with one or more plastic surgeons for more information on safer breast reconstruction. If you have implants, especially if you think you may have an unexplained illness, you may want to have them replaced.
www.fda.gov/cdrh/breastimplants/
"Experts still question long-term safety of silicone breast implants" Health Canada, January 12 2006.
Health Detective
Who's Smarter — You or a Squirrel?
A subscriber, Robert L. Elder, sent me an e-mail with an interesting observation. "I planted some corn last year at the farm," he said. "It was GMO corn (genetically-modified) with insecticides built in. This was to keep the corn borer out of the stalk and keep the stalks from falling over. I am not in favor of GMO seed.
"The thing about this corn is that the squirrels at my home in Lawrence, Kansas won't eat it. I wrote the seed company a letter wanting to know if the chemical entered the ears of corn that were sold as feed. The letter was mailed the first week in January and now, more than two months later, I haven't received an explanation. The squirrels are smarter than people."
This is not the first time I've heard about animals that wouldn't eat genetically modified foods. Look for Non-GMO on the boxes of all foods, especially those containing corn and soy. Or buy organic foods. And thank the next squirrel you see for helping you stay healthy.
Are We Really Winning the War on Cancer?
What good news! The National Center for Health Statistics announced that fewer Americans are dying of cancer. What they didn't say was that the number of deaths declined last year from 557,272 to 556,902. That's 370 fewer deaths in one year across the U.S. This isn't anything to shout about.
Deaths in men fell by 778, and increased in women by 409, so more women died of cancer than in the previous year. So much for winning the cancer war. That was just a headline-making story.
There has been a reduction in some cancers: primarily stomach and lung. And lung cancer rates have dropped because more people quit smoking, not because of any changes in treatment or diagnosis from the medical community.
I think we can reduce deaths from cancer by improving our diets, implementing regular stress reduction, exercising more, and cleaning up our environment. We can use diet and specific supplements to improve our immune systems, detoxify our body from harmful carcinogens, and prevent cancer cells from forming tumors.
But the announcement that we're winning the war on cancer is not just inaccurate; it gives people the impression that they don't have to work hard to stay healthy. I think we do.
The Moss Report, www.cancerdecisions.com.
More Research on Noni Juice
A lot of people are making claims about Noni juice (Morinda citrifolia) that haven't been substantiated in human studies. I'm against spending a lot of money on a fruit juice product with little or no science behind it. So I was interested to read a small study that looked at using Noni juice to improve hearing in women with osteoporosis or osteopenia, two forms of bone loss.
The study participants drank two ounces of Noni juice, or a placebo, twice a day for three months. They also took more calcium. Those who drank the real thing showed a slight improvement in bone remodeling and a "trend" toward improved hearing — but no significant improvement. The women who didn't drink Noni juice had slightly worse hearing. Perhaps a longer study will reveal more solid benefits.
Then there was a report about a 45-year-old man who had elevated liver enzymes after drinking Noni juice, for three weeks. After he stopped the juice, his liver enzymes normalized. Liver toxicity was confirmed by a liver biopsy. Without sufficient science showing Noni's safety and efficacy, I still say, "wait."
Babich, M. "Effects of Morinda citrifolia on quality of life and auditory function in postmenopausal women," Journ of Alt and Complemen Med, vol 10, no 5, 2004.
Millonig, et al. "Herbal hepatotoxicity: acute hepatitis caused by a Noni preparation (Morinda citrifolia)," European Journ of Gastroent & Hepatol, April 2005.
Ask Dr. Nan
Q: I'm interested in your opinion on food combining. The views I've read are confusing. Some say not to combine proteins with starches, flesh with dairy, and always eat fruit alone. However, there are foods like beans that contain proteins and starches. Help!! — V.R., via e-mail
A: I understand your confusion and I think I can simplify all of this for you. Separating flesh with dairy is one of the tenets of Kosher cooking. If you're not Kosher, this type of food combining should not be an issue.
Separating protein from starches stems back to a food-combining diet that was popular more than 30 years ago. It's easier to digest than a meal containing a combination of protein, starches, and fruit because these foods are digested at various rates and need different digestive juices and enzymes to break down different foods. I used it when I first began counseling patients.
Then I decided to strengthen my patients' digestion with simple lifestyle changes: eating when they're relaxed (instead of stressed) and chewing their food well. I gave them either digestive enzymes or probiotics, sometimes both. Lo and behold, they were able to eat a sandwich and other "forbidden" meal combinations without problems.
My question to you is: Do you want to eliminate your symptoms or eliminate their underlying problem?
I know that many people swear by a diet based on food combining and don't find it difficult to adhere to it. However, I don't think this is necessary, except, perhaps, for a short time while improving your digestion.
By the way, poor digestion was my major health problem most of my life. I constantly suffered from gas, bloating, and other gastrointestinal problems.
Since I "repaired" my digestive system, I find I can eat anything I like with no problems. If I eat a particularly large or fatty meal, which is rare, I do take digestive enzymes with that meal.
Q: I don't make or absorb enough vitamin B12. What can I do about this? — D.J., Mabank, TX
A: Only a small amount of vitamin B12 can be manufactured in your body, and we're not sure how much of it is absorbed. You probably have a problem with absorption. Vitamin B12 is one of the few nutrients that is absorbed through the large intestine (colon). Your body may not be making a substance called intrinsic factor. Intrinsic factor is needed for vitamin B12 absorption. Aging, stomach problems including antacids, and stress cut down on your ability to make this co-factor. You may get better absorption if you take hydrochloric acid with meals.
If you're deficient in vitamin B12, talk with your doctor about getting a few injections just to bring up your levels.
Then, consider taking a high-potency supplement. I like sublingual tablets that dissolve under the tongue. They get into the body rapidly.
One such product is B12-Folate by ProThera (888-488-2488). It contains 2,500 mcg of B12 along with some folic acid. You can take just one tablet a day.
Vitamin B12 is found primarily in animal protein. However, in my 27 years of nutritional counseling, I've found more meat-eaters than vegetarians who are deficient in this vitamin.