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Fibromyalgia Dietary Considerations.

24 Apr

Anti-inflammatory foods can be broken down into four categories: 1) Fruits and vegetables; 2) Protein Sources; 3) Fats and Oils; and 4) Beverages.

In the fruits and vegetables category, whole fruits, berries, and vegetables in general are rich in good things like vitamins, minerals, fiber, anti-oxidants, and phytochemicals. In particular, green and brightly colored vegetables and whole foods (such as broccoli, chard, strawberries, blueberries, spinach, carrots, and squash) are great choices.

Besides being low in calories, high in fiber, rich in vitamin/minerals and more, berries EVEN taste good! For example, one cup of strawberries contains >100mg of vitamin C (similar to a cup of orange juice), which helps our immune system function. One cup of blueberries includes a little less vitamin C but it has minerals, phytochemicals, and anti-oxidants at only 83 calories per cup. A cup of cranberries has only 44 calories (it can also help with bladder infections), and a cup of raspberries has 64 calories and has vitamin C and potassium. Less common, but equally nutritious, are loganberries, currants, gooseberries, lingonberries, and bilberries. Put these, or a mixture of these, on salads, yogurt, or a whole grain cereal and enjoy a VERY satisfying snack or meal! The health benefits of phytochemicals and flavonoids include cancer prevention, bladder infection treatment, and may even help your eyesight (such as from lutein in blueberries and raspberries).

Protein sources include fish/seafood, especially oily ocean fish like salmon and tuna, as these are rich in omega-3 fatty acids. Soy and soy foods like tofu and tempeh as well as legumes are great plant sources of protein, though some doctors may recommend staying away from soy. Nuts such as walnuts, almonds, pecans, and Brazil nuts are also great protein sources.

Fats and Oils: Omega-3 fatty acids can be found in flax seeds, canola oil, and pumpkin seeds, as well as cold-water oily fish. Other fats that are anti-inflammatory include monounsaturated fatty acids, which are found in olive oil, avocados, and nuts and have been found to be cardiovascular disease “friendly” as well. Other healthy oils include rice bran oil, grape seed oil, and walnut oil.

Beverages: Our bodies need water! Of course, tap, sparkling, or bottled water are great sources of water. So are 100% juices, herbal tea, low-sodium vegetable juice, and if tolerated, low or non-fat milk.

Meal suggestions include: Breakfast – oatmeal with fresh berries and walnuts; Snacks – whole fruits, nuts, seeds, and fresh vegetables; Lunch and Dinner– choose fish and less fatty red meats; cook with olive and canola oil; load up a salad with fresh vegetables and fruit, avoid deep fried foods – rather, bake, broil, poach, or stir-fry instead. Fill up HALF of your dinner plate with dark green or brightly colored vegetables. Avoid the following: junk food, high-fat meats, sugar (sodas, pastries, candy, rich desserts, and sweetened cereals), highly processed foods, trans-fats and saturated fats (i.e., bacon and sausage), and white flour products (get 100% whole grain instead). Some research suggests not eating “nightshade plants” like tomatoes and eggplant.

If you, a friend or family member requires care for Fibromyalgia, we sincerely appreciate the trust and confidence shown by choosing our services!

GO NUTS!

23 Apr

Our basic premise is that your body is amazing. You get a do over. It doesn’t take that long, and it isn’t that hard if you know what to do. In these notes, we give you a short course in what to do so it becomes easy for you, and for you to teach others. We want you to know how much control you have over both the quality and length of your life.

This month we want you to Go Nuts. Yes, GO NUTS every day. Another key study—it is HUGE—looked at 3 million years of men and women’s lives– and indicates that eating an ounce of nuts a night (walnuts are our favorite for health benefits, as they are the only nuts with those omega-3) can reduce your risk of dying from any cause by 20%–that’s as great as your benefit from walking an extra 6,000 steps a day or quitting a ¼ pack per day cigarette habit. That’s a HUGE effect from an ounce of nuts… and the people who did it were thinner too!

Yes, we already had nine studies including three randomized controlled trials (the “gold standard” of studies) indicating nuts reduced risk of major chronic diseases, including cardiovascular disease, and type 2 diabetes mellitus, and one on cancer of the breast and prostate with walnuts… so what’s so big here?

What’s so important is this data covered “all causes of death” —heart disease, stroke, cancer of all types, respiratory disease—and it involved many people followed for many years. Let’s get specific about this study, and then we’ll describe some of the others that support an ounce of GOING NUTS EVERY NIGHT as a way to stay younger.

This study examined nut consumption and subsequent total and cause-specific mortality among 76,464 women in the Nurses’ Health Study (1980–2010) and 42,498 men in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study (1986–2010). Nut consumption was assessed at baseline and updated every two to four years. Now, here’s a HUGE part—they followed these people for nearly three decades, during which time 16,200 women and 11,229 men died. Nut consumption was inversely associated with total mortality among both women and men, after adjustment for all other known or suspected risk factors. The ratio for death among participants who ate nuts, as compared with those who did not, was 0.80 for seven or more times per week—in our terms that means your RealAge is 2.6 years younger from just eating an ounce of nuts every day. WOW. Who knew getting younger could be so easy—and I love nuts!

Now for some other data: Walnuts and Pistachios are the Mike Roizen and Mehmet Oz of nuts – cause like us, they’ve got a hard shell covering a center of pure goodness (stop that laughing!)…

Walnuts: In a large Spanish study comparing a Mediterranean-style diet with 1.5 ounces of nuts and/or olive oil a day versus the usual Spanish diet, the walnuts-olive oil groups enjoyed a 30% reduced heart attack and stroke rate, not too shabby from just enjoying walnuts. And, eating two ounces of shelled walnuts a day made blood vessels more flexible (a sign of heart health) and improved cholesterol levels, reduced high blood pressure, and made glucose control, and insulin regulation better.

Please turn over…

But these walnuts aren’t the only nuts that have turned out to help you achieve a younger RealAge! A very interesting study about pistachios looked at the amount of healthy bacteria in stool samples of people who ate pistachios compared to those who ate no pistachios at all. It turns out that pistachios came out the winner for promoting the growth of beneficial microbes in the digestive tract; another choice, almonds, ranked number two (no pun intended).

So any nut, even peanuts (a legume), reduced all cause mortality in that large recent study. But we have our own favorite ways of eating them. It seems nuts have their own hierarchy (and we’re not talking about who gets voted off the island first). You want them to be raw, fresh, and unsalted. That’s because nuts lose up to 15 percent of their healthy oils when they’re roasted (roasting at high temperatures may even cause the formation of chemicals that promote aging). Here’s our pecking order for processing nuts, from best to worst:

• Fresh
• Freshly toasted or dry roasted (in your oven: roast at 350F for 9 minutes)
• Roasted in their own fat and salted (packaged)

We don’t eat any nuts roasted in partially hydrogenated fat or nuts that are sugared.

Tony Soprano’s sidekick Paulie ‘Walnuts’ Gualtieri was always frantically worried about his health. He could have found it in eating an ounce of his nickname a day. That would have made him and will make you healthier, happier, and protect your heart, brain, lungs, sex life, kidneys, and that youthful glow on your skin! So enjoy GOING NUTS EVERY DAY!!

Thanks for reading. And feel free to send more questions–you can always send us questions at youdocs@gmail.com, and some of them we may know enough to answer (we’ll try to get answers for you if we do not know).

Young Dr Mike Roizen (aka, The Enforcer)

NOTE: You should NOT take this as medical advice.
This article is of the opinion of its author.
Before you do anything, please consult with your doctor.

New Research Shows How Sugary Drinks Are Probably Harming Children As Young As 2 To 5 Years Old…

18 Apr

Earlier this year, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg proposed a ban that would stop restaurants, delis, movie theaters, food carts, and stadiums from selling certain sugary drinks in containers larger than 16 ounces as a way to help combat obesity in the city. As you can imagine, there was enormous public and political backlash.

Eventually, an appeals court ruled against the proposed ban just before it could go into effect, citing that it was an overreach of executive power. While it may not be Mayor Bloomberg’s place to tell you or your children not to drink sugary drinks, research has tightly linked sugar-sweet beverage consumption to weight gain among older children. But what about younger children?

New research published in Pediatrics, the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics, studied 9,600 children from birth to age five. The

researchers found correlations between sugary drink consumption by children as young as two years old and weight gain in later years. The drinks examined in the study were sodas, sports drinks, and any other sugar-added beverages or juice drinks that were not 100 percent juice.

Because of the study’s size and length of follow- up, many experts believe the information to be very valuable.

According to Dr. Dyan Hes, Medical Director of Gramercy Pediatrics in Manhattan, who has been lobbying for public policies like soda taxes that would make these drinks less attractive to families, “It’s a fantastic study because we need more evidence… We know that sugar-sweetened beverages are the greatest contributor to increased obesity in young children because they’re cheap. It shows that by giving your children sugar-sweetened beverages

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by age two, you’ve already set up habits that are very hard to break.”

Here’s what is really important about this study: The study did not find that two year olds who drank at least one sugar-sweetened drink to be any heavier than other two year olds. But, drinking just one sugary drink per day did set those toddlers up for weight gain in the near future. In fact, the children who drank at least one sugary drink per day were already heavier by the age of five.

According to Scientific America: In fact, they were 1.43 times more likely to be obese than preschoolers who consumed sugary drinks less than daily, even after accounting for other factors that could influence weight gain. Mark DeBoer, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Virginia, says the findings support the hypothesis that regular consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages has a cumulative effect over time. “We were struck by this data that even at a very young age, the sugar- sweetened beverages contribute to weight gain… and we wanted to put this information out for pediatricians and for families to help them make healthier choices for their children.”

Why Do Sugary Drinks Cause So Much Weight Gain?

The answer to that question is most likely two- fold. First, is simple caloric intake.

Sugary drinks are full of “empty calories.” In other words, they contain very little (if any) nutritional value but are high in calories. These calories, because they are liquid, do not make you feel full. So someone drinking all these empty calories will still need to eat solid food to feel full, increasing the total amount of calories consumed in a day. The second reason is how your body chemically reacts to sugar. These types of drinks are usually loaded with fructose. Fructose can be harmful to your body by setting up the conditions for not only obesity, but also diabetes.

This “junk sugar” unstabilizes blood sugar levels and makes your pancreas work overtime. Your pancreas is the organ responsible for secreting the hormone insulin so the sugar in your blood stream can be absorbed by cells. After years of sugar consumption, the pancreas may “wear out” and an individual could become a type 2 diabetic.

Many type 2 diabetics start taking insulin injections when the better solution for many may to manage their blood sugar levels may simply be proper diet and exercise. However, the best solution is to prevent the condition altogether by limiting consumption of bad sugar, such as sugary drinks (along with a proper diet and regular, moderate exercise).

Here Is Something Disturbing…

A UCLA study published in the Journal of Physiology is the first to show how a steady diet high in fructose can damage your memory and learning. Researchers investigated the effects of high-fructose syrup. It’s similar to high-fructose corn syrup, a cheap sweetener six times sweeter than cane sugar which is used in most soft drinks, processed foods, condiments, and even many baby foods.

They fed rats a fructose solution instead of clean drinking water for six weeks. Then, they tested their ability to remember the way out of a maze.

The results were quite shocking. The rats fed fructose syrup struggled to negotiate the maze, demonstrating significant impairment in their cognitive abilities. They were slower and their brains showed a decline in synaptic activity. Their brain cells had trouble signaling each other, disrupting the rats’ ability to think clearly and recall the route they’d learned six weeks earlier.

Additionally, the fructose-fed rats showed signs of resistance to insulin, a hormone that controls your blood sugar and synaptic function in your brain.

Researchers concluded that a high-fructose diet negatively affects the way the brain functions. According to Dr. Fernando Gomez-Pinilla, a Professor of Neurosurgery at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and a Professor of Integrative Biology and Physiology in the UCLA College of Letters and Science, “Our findings illustrate that what you eat affects how you think… Eating a high-fructose diet over the long-term alters your brain’s ability to learn and remember information.”

What Not To Do On Facebook If You Want Great Relationships!

17 Apr

If you are on Facebook, this information might be very important to you. Why? New research from the University of Birmingham, University West of England, and the University of Edinburgh has found that sharing pictures of yourself on Facebook might have a significant negative impact on your real-life relationships. According to CBS News, “People who frequently post photos to Facebook can’t control how their various ‘friends’ will perceive the posts. It’s worth remembering that the information we post to our ‘friends’ on Facebook actually gets viewed by lots of different categories of people [including] partners, friends, family, colleagues, and acquaintances,” said Dr. David Houghton, lead author of the report… and each group seems to take a different view of the information shared. Our research found that those who frequently post photographs on Facebook risk damaging real-life relationships. This is because people, other than very close friends and relatives, don’t seem to relate well to those who constantly share photos of themselves.”

The study also found that people who share a lot of pictures of themselves tend to have less intimacy and closeness in their real relationships. The researchers also discovered that people who shared pictures for advertisers (with pictures of products) were viewed negatively. In other words, you may be helping the brand awareness of the product while also damaging your own personal relationships.

5 Health Facts You May Not Know.

16 Apr

Do you the ideal temperature for optimal sleep? Did you know that a certain type of food can help alleviate a migraine headache? What about belly fat, where does that come from? Here’s the inside scoop on these and other little-known facts…

  • Half of American adults do not get enough sleep. While many factors may play a part, one simple thing you can

    do to sleep better is to lower the thermostat. The ideal temperature for sleep is around 68 degrees. If you’re

    having trouble sleeping, drop it down to about 65 degrees.

  • While certain supplements can help alleviate migraines, beans are a surprising natural alternative. Black beans, kidney beans, and chickpeas all are rich in magnesium, which plays a critical role in alleviating headaches.
  • Certain foods and vitamins can actually help elevate your mood and alleviate some symptoms of mild depression. Among the most beneficial foods to lift your spirits are dark chocolate, salmon, and dark-colored vegetables (such as peppers and broccoli).
  • Prolonged stress results in increased production of cortisol, our primary stress hormone. This increase in cortisol triggers an ancient biochemical reaction in us, and as a result, the body responds as if it is starving and automatically stores fat in the belly. While stress may be a major cause of belly fat, alcohol can make it even harder to lose. Aside from the sugar and the calories involved, it is the way in which alcohol is metabolized by the liver and its biochemical effects on your hormonal balance that contributes to belly fat production.
  • We’ve all heard that carrots are great for the eyes, but spinach and salmon are actually two of the most beneficial foods for your eyesight. The combination of antioxidants in the spinach and the omega-3 fatty acids in the fish can strengthen and protect your eyes.

Wonder Twin Powers Have Been Activated! How New England Twins Frances and Lucas Rosa Turned Tragedy Into Incredible Success and Have Become Role Models For Children, Teens, and Young Adults All Over The World.

15 Apr

Without the bad, how could we value the good? Without tragedy, how can we truly experience and understand happiness? These puzzling paradoxes are what often make life both difficult and wonderful.

New England twins, Frances and Lucas Rosa, are no strangers to these very paradoxes. At only 16 years of age, they have turned unimaginable tragedy into incredible success, and they are an inspiration for children, teens, and adults all around the world.

Frances and Lucas lost their older brother Vincent when they were only eight. About six months later, they lost another brother, Dominick. Dominick was taken at the age of 21 by heroin and Vincent passed at age 23 by a Fentanyl patch, a painkiller like morphine commonly used for cancer patients. Both had struggled with substance abuse for several years.

There is an old saying that goes something like this: There are only two kinds of people in the world when the going gets tough. Those who run away, cringe, and cower, and those who stand up and fight with all they’ve got. The Rosa twins are the latter… times ten.

Frances and Lucas made the decision to use their brothers as motivation to become the best people they can be and to help others along the way.

Both Frances and Lucas are on the Winnacunnet High School wrestling team, and according to their coach, they are the hardest working kids on the team. They have been extremely successful wrestlers, with both ranked in the top 10 in their state.

But, these two “wonder twins” are much more than just tough wrestlers. At the age of only 16, they are also published authors! They wrote the book Cryptidpedia: The Encyclopedia of Unexplained Phenomena, Strange Places and Rumored Creatures Not Yet Proven Real completely by themselves from ages 12 to 16. The book is 312 pages long and has an incredible illustration on each page, accompanied by a short paragraph description.

Clearly, the Rosa twins have achieved more by the age of 16 than most people twice their age by understanding that life is all about one thing: perspective. The definition of perspective is: The proper or accurate point of view or the ability to see it.

Frances and Lucas have the ability to do what most 40 year olds cannot. They understand that life is not easy. It is not all fun and games. In fact, it is not fair, and it will kick you in the teeth sometimes. They have embraced the difficulties and challenges of life, and made the conscious decision to use it as motivation to even greater success.

Every time life kicks, they kick harder. Due to their perspective and ability to think accurately and take action, they will ALWAYS be successful at WHATEVER they choose to do.

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