Have you heard of spirulina? I’ve heard of this food being referred to as a super food, but I’ve not looked into it much until today. Let me share what I’ve learned.

What is spirulina?

Spirulina would be comparable to a sea vegetable such as kelp or wakame. Spirulina is both a human and animal food or supplement. It’s a member of the “blue-green” family, but it’s not considered algae. It’s actually a type of bacteria – cyanobacteria. Its primary source includes two species of cyanobacteria: Arthrospira platensis and Arthrospira maxima. Japan is currently the largest producer and consumer of spirulina.

Spirulina can be purchased as a tablet, flake, or powder.

What nutrients are provided by spirulina?

Continue reading ‘Spirulina: The Super Food?’ »

If you are to successfully lose weight you will likely focus on eating fewer calories and increasing your activity to burn more calories. It’s important that you also address inflammation on your journey to lose weight.

Research on mice has shown a “switch” controlling inflammation in the hypothalamus (region of the brain that regulates energy) becomes “flipped on” in response to high fat diets. It also shows that “overnutrition” (i.e. eating too much) turns on this inflammatory switch.

An increased level of inflammation leads our cells to become resistant to insulin and leptin.

Insulin plays a messenger role in that it tells cells it is time to take in glucose (sugar). If cells become resistant to insulin, they ignore the message that it is time to take in more glucose, glucose is converted to fatty acids, and is stored by our fat cells. If insulin resistance is persistent, eventually the fat cells will no longer respond and increased levels of fatty acids will remain in circulation.

Leptin is a hormone that triggers satiety. This is your body’s way of telling you you’ve had enough to eat. When production of leptin is hindered, we do not feel satisfied and tend to eat more.

As inflammation causes the cells to ignore the messages of insulin and leptin, you are more likely to consume more calories (because you still feel hungry) and potentially store increased levels of fat due to the increased level of circulating fatty acids.

Continue reading ‘The Effect of Inflammation on Weight Loss’ »

Heart disease is a lifestyle disease. Your diet and lifestyle choices are a major factor in determining your likelihood of developing heart disease.

Heart disease develops as a result of inflammation and oxidative damage. So, let’s cover steps you can take to decrease inflammation and oxidative damage to reduce your risk of developing heart disease.

1. Decrease your sugar intake.

When I say sugar, I’m also referring to simple carbohydrates. When you consume carbohydrates the body breaks them down into sugar molecules. Converting simple carbs (i.e. refined carbohydrates) into sugar is a fairly quick process for the body. Simple carbohydrates include potatoes, pasta, bread, and rice, along with your sugar sweetened beverages, candy, and sweets. As these foods are broken down, sugar enters the blood steam and can result in blood sugar spikes. These spikes contribute to oxidative damage and inflammation.

Continue reading ‘5 Steps to Prevent Heart Disease’ »

During the holidays it can be difficult to control how much we eat. When you attend gatherings with friends and there are all these new dishes you oftentimes want to sample some of everything. Then there are the desserts. . .how can you pass up on all these home cooked goodies?

It’s not easy, but it’s not impossible to stay on track. Let’s review some tips so you can avoid going overboard on portions:

1. Have a snack before attending a holiday party.

If you are going to be attending a holiday party it’s to not go on an empty stomach or work hungry. This will lead you to overeat on especially rich foods. Instead, go ahead and have a snack ahead of time, such as a piece of fruit or small handful of nuts.

2. Don’t eat in front of the TV.

Continue reading ‘Portion Control at the Holidays: Will you succeed?’ »

If you are working to lose weight you need to make adjustments to your food choices. However, don’t forget what you drink has an impact on your success also. There can be a surprising amount of calories in beverages.

Let’s say you are reducing your calorie intake to 1500 calories per day. If you stop at Starbucks for a 16 oz Vanilla Frappucino with 2% milk, a 12 oz. can of Dr. Pepper with lunch, and a 16 oz. sweetened ice tea with dinner, you’ve consumed around 565 calories just from what you drank. . . and this is assuming you consumed water between meals. That leaves you just 935 calories to “spend” on food for the day if you are going to achieve your goal of 1500 calories per day.

1. Portion size

Keep your portion sizes small. For example, you do not need a 12 ounce glass of juice in the morning, cut back to 6 ounces of fruit juice or better yet replace the juice with a piece of fruit. A 12 ounce glass of juice contains 192 calories.

2. Read food labels correctly

Continue reading ‘Hidden Calories in Beverages’ »

Do you watch the Biggest Loser? If so, you have seen each contestant visit a doctor at the start of the season and many times they’ll learn their actual ‘biological’ age. This usually ends up being a shocker, such as a 28 year-old whose physical condition is that of a 55 year-old or something drastic like that. Telomeres are a tool that can be used to fairly accurately identify your biological age.

I recently participated in a webinar hosted by Spectra Cell Laboratories and lead by Dr. Mark Houston discussing telomeres.

What is a telomere?

Telomeres are a DNA sequence that appears at the end of each chromosome. Chromosomes comprised of DNA are in each cell of our body. Our DNA is protected at each end by telomeres. Dr. Houston describes a telomere as a safety cap or ball cap on the end of each chromosome. They protect the chromosome and DNA from things like oxidative stress. As the telomere becomes damaged the chromosome and cell function ineffectively the cell begins to die.

Telomere Shortening

As a normal part of aging, telomeres become shorter. Once a telomere becomes shortened there is no way to lengthen the telomere.

There are many factors that influence how quickly telomeres shorten. Here are some of the factors that impact telomere length:

Continue reading ‘What is Your Biological Age?’ »

On September 13, 2011, the Department of Health and Human Services launched Million Hearts. Million Hearts is aimed to prevent 1 million heart attacks and strokes over the next five years.

Cardiovascular disease costs $444 billion annually in medical costs and lost productivity.

Million Hearts focuses on two goals:

1. Empower Americans to make health choices.

This includes preventing the use of tobacco, reducing sodium and trans fat intake. Taking this steps can mean decreased medical treatment (and costs) for blood pressure and cholesterol.

2. Improve care of those who need treatment.

The initiated is targeted to using Aspirin for people at risk, promotion of Blood pressure control, Cholesterol management, and Smoking cessation. This treatment focus is being referred to as the “ABCS” and is intended to cover the major risk factors for heart disease, which means prevention of heart attacks and strokes.

Continue reading ‘Million Hearts: Prevent 1 Million Heart Attacks and Strokes in 5 Years’ »

The holidays are here again, so let’s review some tips so you stick with your diet to lower cholesterol levels AND still enjoy a satisfying Thanksgiving meal.

Tip #1: Pass the Gravy

Traditional gravy is a high fat source. To make your gravy a little healthy, use a spoon to remove fat from meat and poultry dishes prior to mixing up your gravy. Another option to remove the fat is to freeze the pan drippings and then remove them before making gravy. Next, don’t go overboard. Add a little gravy for flavoring and pass it on.

Tip #2: Trim the Turkey

Limit your turkey to about 4 ounces. This would be right around the size or a deck of cards. Select white turkey meat without the skin to cut back on unnecessary fat calories.

Tip #3: Stuff the stuffing right

Boost your veggie intake by sautéing a lot of veggies into your stuffing. Some veggies may include finely diced celery, carrots, and onions.

Continue reading ‘7 Tips to Lower Cholesterol & Still Enjoy Thanksgiving’ »

Shouldn’t you be the “picture of health” as a young adult? Guess it shouldn’t come as a surprise that looks are deceiving.

Canadian researchers presented study results recently at the 2011 Canadian Cardiovascular Congress regarding their study of 168 adults between the ages of 18 and 35 years-old.

Study participants had no family history of heart disease, nor any other known risk factors, such as diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, or smoking.

Guess what? Researchers found a “staggering” number of participants to have atherosclerosis, which is a build-up of plaque along artery walls. Almost half of participants had signs of atherosclerosis – 48%.

Height, weight, body mass index (BMI), and waist circumference were recorded for all participants. MRI scans measured both subcutaneous (fat under the skin) and visceral fat (fat around vital organs).

These measurements found many participants to have greater waist circumferences and higher levels of visceral fat within the chest and abdomen. These high levels of visceral fat increase risk of suffering a heart attack or stroke at some point in their lives. It’s this high level of visceral fat that is likely contributing to the early signs of atherosclerosis.

These Canadian findings corroborate previous research that has found up to 80% of young American’s killed in war or car accidents to have premature and hidden atherosclerosis.

What Can You Do?

Continue reading ‘Clogged Arteries: Young Doesn’t Equal Healthy’ »

The winter months are approaching, which means it’s time to address Vitamin D.

Vitamin D deficiency is fairly common. Vitamin D is not actually a vitamin, but a hormone the body produces from sunlight.

According to recent review of existing research there is evidence low vitamin D levels impact cardiovascular disease risk, specifically blood pressure, insulin resistance, and coronary artery disease. The review of around 75 mostly observational studies was published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology this month.

Whether or not taking supplemental vitamin D will reduce cardiovascular risks or how much is needed to be effective is still to be determined. We now need more randomized control research studies to examine the impact of high dose Vitamin D supplementation to weigh the pros against the cons.

Daily Vitamin D Recommendation

Continue reading ‘Does Vitamin D Deficiency Increase Cardiovascular Risk?’ »