Nutrition

Flavonoid-Enriched Chocolate: A Functional Food for Overall Health

Dr. Kathleen Jade — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 21:52:57 GMT

Being a (dark) chocoholic, I always experience a twinge of pleasure when I read about another research study demonstrating the health benefits of dark chocolate. These health-promoting properties stem, in part, from chocolate’s astonishingly high flavonoid levels and its antioxidant activity.

Flavonoids are a diverse group of plant compounds occurring in fruit, vegetables, tea, red wine, and dark chocolate or cocoa. Diets rich in these compounds have been associated with a reduced risk for cardiovascular disease and other chronic diseases. Cocoa and chocolate are rich sources the subclass of flavonoids known as procyanidins.

Recently, a number of nutraceutical manufacturers have been boosting chocolate’s flavonoid levels even higher, creating new products that are very rich in total procyanidins.

In one of the latest chocolate-related studies to be published, Spanish researchers found that a procyanidin-enriched cocoa powder significantly lowered blood pressure in rats with hypertension. In fact, the cocoa product worked just as well for lowering the rats’ blood pressures as the commonly used anti-hypertensive medication, Captopril. You can read the abstract here: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jf804045b

Other studies using various forms of dark chocolate and cocoa, including some studies in humans, have shown how chocolate helps protect against cardiovascular diseases such as heart disease and stroke. It works through various actions, including blood-clot prevention, protection against oxidative stress, and blood pressure-lowering.

If you’re ready to start adding chocolate to your diet to improve your health, you don’t need to be consuming a flavonoid-enriched version to benefit, just make sure you’re eating just an ounce or two of at least 70% dark chocolate, cocoa powder, or cocoa nibs daily. Enjoy!

What a Physician-Supervised Detoxification Program Can Do For You

Dr. Kathleen Jade — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 00:14:23 GMT

One of the best ways each and every one of us can take charge of our health is by detoxifying our minds and bodies. We all know, intuitively, that living a healthier lifestyle and taking a more proactive approach to our wellness is the greatest gift we can give ourselves and others. Science is currently proving that for most of us, nutrition and lifestyle, not genes, play the largest role in our health and disease patterns.

Despite this, many of us just can’t seem to make the commitment. A physician- supervised detoxification program may be the answer. By helping to make health and wellness a daily priority, this type of detoxification program sets the stage for a new way of healthy living.

We all have a low-grade accumulation of toxins in our bodies from a polluted environment, excessive alcohol or caffeine, smoking, faulty diet, medications, stress, and too little exercise. At the Center for Health Awareness, we incorporate the latest scientific and clinical understanding of detoxification in order to decrease this toxicity and reduce common symptoms such as fatigue, low energy, digestive complaints, and muscle aches and pains.

The program is a “nutritionally based” metabolic detoxification program and not a quick-fix fad or a drastic fast. This type of nutritionally based detoxification has been demonstrated to reduce the muscle pain of fibromyalgia, improve sleep, and decrease migraines in many studies. I’ve seen patients in our program reduce their cholesterol, lose weight, break their food addictions, and overcome digestive difficulties.

As a naturopathic physician, my goal is to empower my patients with the knowledge, motivation, and appropriate tools to reach optimal wellness. Choosing to detoxify and make the right kinds of diet and lifestyle changes can help overcome the effects of living in a toxic world. Never before has there been such in-depth understanding of detoxification and its power in bringing about a state of radiant optimal wellness.

Cleansing toxins from your body can add vitality, wellness, and energy to your life. Detoxification provides a one-of-a-kind opportunity to achieve a higher level of health. You’ll feel better, look better, and learn how to incorporate new healthy habits into your daily life in a sustainable way.

I highly recommend finding a naturopathic physician or a holistic, nutritionally-minded MD who can help design a safe, effective detoxification program that is right for you.

Gluten Sensitivity Is More Common Than You Think

Dr. Kathleen Jade — Fri, 06 Oct 2006 20:17:52 GMT

Natural food markets, restaurants, bakeries, coffee shops, and even the conventional supermarkets are carrying an expanding array of baked goods made with alternative, gluten-free grains. It seems that more and more of us are becoming increasingly aware of bothersome symptoms that improve when we remove gluten-containing foods from our diets. In fact, recent research backs this up by indicating that immune sensitivity to gluten is exceedingly common.

Gluten is a protein that is a component of sticky, stretchable grains: wheat, barley and rye. Gluten sensitivity implies that a person's immune system is intolerant of gluten and is forming antibodies or displaying some other evidence of an inflammatory reaction. When these reactions cause small intestinal damage visible under a microscope, the syndrome is called celiac disease. This intestinal damage can also be measured via two blood tests, anti-endomysial antibodies and tissue transglutaminase.

In the past, celiac disease was thought of as a relatively rare . However, based on recent research, we now know that it is entirely possible for people to be forming antibodies to gluten, but still have negative blood tests and intestinal biopsies. New tests can measure antibodies to gluten in the stool; these often show up before they are detected in the blood. People with stool antibodies to gluten may have IBS-type symptoms, such as abdominal pain, bloating, constipation, gas, and heartburn. Even symptoms that seem completely unrelated to digestion, such as joint pain, anxiety, canker sores, anemia, osteoporosis, fatigue, and frequent illness can be caused by gluten intolerance.

The new stool test allows identification of clinically important gluten sensitivity before significant intestinal damage has developed. This is the ideal scenario for gluten sensitivity because by the time the small intestine becomes damaged, malnutrition has been present for years often causing irreversible osteoporosis. In addition, autoimmune syndromes occur more commonly the longer a gluten sensitive person eats gluten. As common as gluten sensitivity seems to be we all must begin thinking in a more preventive health way about gluten sensitivity and should take strides to identify it and treat it before it becomes full-fledged celiac disease.