Even more dangerous transfat substitute….

Welcome to our health & self help blog.

Focus on Your Health:

In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.

Today's post: Friday, 1-26-2007

Even more dangerous transfat substitute….

Reuters on Yahoo Health news & other online news sources have recently reported absolutely horrible & scary news.

Someone noticed that transfats (aka: trans fats & “partially hydrogenated” oil) were getting seriously bad press & beginning to be outlawed & decided to try FULLY hydrogenated oils as a substitute.

The good news is that this avoids having to label your food as having transfats & avoid any transfat bans like the one New York City enacted recently. And, this would enable the food company to keep using a fat substitute that has a long shelf life.

The horrible & scary news reported recently is that fully saturated oils (aka interesterified oils or fats) are not as bad as transfats, they are MUCH WORSE.

The study recently reported found that fully saturated oils, or interesterified oils or fats, had very similar impact on lowering the beneficial HDL levels in people who ate them that was similar to transfats; and it also sharply increased blood sugar levels. Ouch.

Too high blood sugar levels usually cause some form of cardiovascular disease & circulation problems: nerve damage; blindness; heart attacks; strokes; impotence; peripheral artery disease; circulation problem induced mental decline; & even foot amputation.

Even worse, there are often no signs this is happening when a person’s blood sugar gets elevated like this. So, it is common to have some damage done to your health before you know it’s happening to you.

(This is why you should get your fasting glucose & the 90 day moving average of your glucose levels called the HBA1C test done every so often so you can take early action if your blood sugar level becomes too high.)

But there’s more bad news. I suspect that the most likely outfits to use this kind of fat are fast food & snack food companies.

And, typically, the people who consume these foods now are younger & less educated & poorer than the people likely to get periodic blood sugar tests & who are able to do so.

Simply put, this is a recipe for disaster.

In my opinion, any company that uses this kind of fat & continues to use it now that this information is in the public domain is guilty of unethical behavior. And, a good case can be made they are also guilty of criminal negligence.

This would make a great case for a law firm specializing in class action suits.

Meanwhile, any time you buy a packaged food, read the label. It’s not enough to see it’s listed as having zero transfats.

If it has partially hydrogenated, fully hydrogenated, fully saturated, or interesterified oils or fats listed in the ingredients, it will harm your health to eat it.

So, don’t buy it or eat it.

Restaurants are tougher. Too often they don’t really know what is in the bulk oils & fats they buy in the first place, so they can’t inform you since they themselves don’t know.

Today, you have four choices.

1. Eat much less often in restaurants.

2. Only eat in restaurants that DO know for sure all of what kinds of oils they use & use none of these health damaging fats.

3. Or eat in restaurants that are so health oriented they ONLY use extra virgin olive oil or small amounts of butter or other oils, like sesame or walnut oil.

4. Only eat foods to which no fats are added when you eat in restaurants. That means fruit, fruit or vegetable juice; uncooked or steamed vegetables; salad with no dressing, etc. (That one is hard to do when you are hungry & defeats the purpose of going to a restaurant to a large extent.)

So, I think choice 2 & 3 or maybe some of choice 1 are the winners.

New ways to get rid of snoring & sleep apnea....

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Focus on Your Health:

In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.

Today's post: Tuesday, 1-23-2007

New ways to get rid of snoring & sleep apnea.

Loud snoring can cause your significant other to sleep in a separate bedroom or worse.

And, it may be a symptom of sleep apnea or the things that cause the loud snoring may get worse & also lead to sleep apnea.

Sleep apnea is dangerous. The lack of oxygen can damage your brain; & it tends to produce high blood pressure & make heart disease more likely. Plus the lack of sleep it causes can make you feel bad, tired, & spacey. Worse, you may get sleepy enough to be in an accident that injures you or someone else.

Here are some ways to combat these things.

1. In the last few days I discovered a new way to treat sleep apnea. It also has worked well for loud snoring.

The old one is called positive airway pressure. It works reliably; but it depends on reliable electric power; & it almost literally ties you to the air pump with a hose as you sleep. So it’s very inconvenient to use. So much so that many people cannot make themselves do it. And, it’s not exactly something you can take with you easily while traveling.

The new method I saw is called the Pillar Procedure. And, the company that makes it is Restore Medical. At www.restoremedical.com they have a place to look up local doctors who perform it. It worked well for the area where I live.

Once you have it done, there’s nothing to take with you or be tied to. It’s more like having a small cavity filled; and quite a bit faster it sounds like.

Instead of a major surgery that has significant post-operative pain that the other medical procedure caused that has been in common use, this procedure is so noninvasive you are done in less than 15 minutes.

And, one patient is quoted as saying he was able to go back to work that afternoon with no problem from any recovery pain.

Breathing improvement exercises & neck strengthening exercises & losing significant amounts of excess bodyfat though improved eating & exercise probably will get the job done also. And, they have other powerful benefits. But, they take weeks or months to work.

This Pillar Procedure sounds like a great first step as it apparently will solve 80 to 98 percent of the problem as soon as it’s done.

2. I get several different online health letters.The one recently by a Dr Blaylock had two things in it about sleep apnea.The good news is that each of them can be sharply improved by things that also have a proven track record of reducing high blood pressure & improving health in other ways.

Here's the first one:

He points out that in some people sleep apnea is caused at least in part by fluid build up in their lungs caused by congestive heart failure.

(If this is bad, see your doctor, as you may need a diuretic to reduce the fluid level.)

The good news is that taking 100 mg of CoQ10 twice a day seems to improve heart failure--dramatically well in some people. And, taking that amount tends to lower high blood pressure about 10 points. It also increases your energy level & improves heart health in other ways.

So, if you don't already do that, consider it because your sleep apnea may improve a bit & if you also have high blood pressure, you’ll likely see both numbers improve.

(Since I added 100 mg of CoQ10 twice a day my blood pressure went down exactly 10 points in both numbers.)

Here's the second one:

Dr Blaylock also points out that regardless of the cause, sleep apnea also increases your inflammation & its marker, C-reactive protein, in your blood.

High C-reactive protein on a blood test is a proven predictor of heart disease or worse heart disease.

The good news is that making sure to eat several servings of vegetables each day other than french fries or baked potatoes -- as well as eating one to three servings of fresh fruit each day & getting at least some moderate exercise each day, like walking for 20 minutes, all lower C-Reactive protein.

And, the potassium & fiber vegetables & fruits contain have been shown to reduce blood pressure in people who start eating them who weren't before.

Eating cooked beans or lentils -- & eating nuts if you aren't allergic to them -- also seem to reduce C-Reactive protein levels.

Even better, eating more vegetables & getting regular exercise will make you less fat. And the less fat you are, the less likely you are to have snoring & sleep apnea.

(Eating nuts that are raw or dry roasted instead of salted & fried in transfats is also important. The dry roasted or raw unsalted ones tend to lower high blood pressure & improve health. Extra salt & transfats tend to do the reverse.)

His newsletter also had several foods that promote health. It turns out strawberries also work great to reduce C-Reactive protein.

Strawberries are high in vitamin C & are very high in their antioxidant level overall. So much so, it’s also thought they help prevent cancer.

They also are high in potassium that tends to lower blood pressure.

So, if you aren't allergic to strawberries & can enjoy them without adding whipped cream, they are almost perfect for cutting C-Reactive protein.

These are some of the several things that stop loud snoring & sleep apnea & prevent them from harming your health.

Lose weight permanently by doing it without hunger

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Focus on Your Health:

In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.

Today's post: Thursday, 1-18-2007

Lose weight permanently by doing it without hunger….

A local woman columnist wrote a column on how she realized she should exercise more & take in less calories. But she said she found it hard to push herself away from the table or eat small portions or deny herself food when she had such strong urges to eat.

I was concerned for her since denying yourself food when you are actually hungry, if it works at all to lose excess fat or lose weight, it almost never works to keep it off.

So I emailed her these key secrets to permanent weight loss & taking off excess fat.

(There are many others. But these are some of the most effective ones. And, she is far more likely to lose fat she keeps off if she uses them instead of denying herself food when she is hungry.)

In order to lose fat & keep it off you do have to burn more calories than you take in initially & not take in more than you burn after that.

That's true.

But the very urge to eat she wrote about makes it hard to impossible to do that permanently for people by "pushing yourself away from the table."

My wife is a history buff & can tell you about some of the events in European history to prove it. But it's quite clear that almost all people today are the descendants of the people who liked to eat when food was available & who tended to eat more when stressed if the food was there to eat. The people who weren’t like that didn’t survive the famines. So most of us are NOT descended from them.

So to make keeping fat off permanently, you have to work out how to eat more or at least not too much less & still not take in more calories than you burn--& you have to do it without feeling hungry.

Mercifully that turns out to be doable.

If you eat protein foods you get a double benefit because processing protein foods is proven to burn up more calories than carbohydrates; & they also make you feel full & fed longer after you eat them.

Even better, the plant based protein foods like beans & nuts have lots of fiber which also helps you feel full. And, nuts also have health-enhancing fats & are satisfying enough they are proven to prevent you from eating other foods enough they are net calorie neutral to eat even with their high fat content.

Other protein foods in moderation that are health-OK include: eggs in moderation; wild caught salmon & sardines; other seafood like shrimp, crab, lobster, & oysters; grass fed ONLY beef & buffalo; & free range chicken & turkey.

I lost 30 pounds & kept it off when I read that Weight Watchers' research has found that green & other nonstarchy vegetables have zero effective calories. Since I knew that vegetables have huge health benefits & that I was eating very few each day, I added just two or three servings MORE each day.

What I found was that this was the biggest secret to weight loss. I'd have a serving of my main protein dish which usually also had health Ok fats like wild caught salmon or beans with extra virgin olive oil & tomato sauce -- & a serving of my cooked broccoli.

This enabled me to be full & satisfied with just that as I was simply no longer hungry.

What I realized was causing the fat loss was that I was no longer eating two servings of main dish or a serving of main dish & dessert that I'd been hungry for before.

So, without making myself stop eating while I was still hungry, I was taking in less calories & was eating more health-enhancing micronutrients.

Since it wasn't that hard, I have simply kept doing it.

The other two things I do that kept me from being really fat in the first place in my sedentary work are:

1. to do a short strength training session several times a week alternating between leg exercise one day & upper body exercise the next & a vigorous session of cardio exercise on 3 nonconsecutive days each week.

So, I burn a LOT more calories -- between the calories burned directly by the exercise & the calories burned by the heavier, more dense muscles it has given me -- than someone my age & height would burn who had similar work.

So, I can literally eat MORE & not fatten up.

2. I never got into the habit of drinking soda or eating junk snack foods. And, I weaned myself away from all refined grains & most sugar.

Those foods are all proven fatteners as they have virtually no fiber or real nutrition so you take in their calories fine but you don't feel less hungry.

It's also helped me stay away from them as I've read of the research on how bad transfats & high fructose corn syrup are for your health.

I hope she finds that helpful. And, I hope it is helpful for you also.

What DOES work to quit smoking….

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Focus on Your Health:

In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.

Today's post: Tuesday, 1-16-2007

What DOES work to quit smoking….

I recently read an article on three doable ways to make effective New Year’s resolutions that would actually improve your health in the online publication, ‘Early To Rise.”

(You can subscribe at www.earlytorise.com . It has very good health & money articles & information.)

The first two “how-to-achieve” suggestions were great.

1. Setting a weekly & clearly doable exercise goal; picking a time to schedule it in your week; & "sticking to it like glue"; & always restarting it if something prevents you from doing it temporarily is extremely effective & sound advice.

2. Making small changes by adding or substituting health-enhancing foods for health-harmful foods is also sound advice & effective. Your health will improve; & if you keep adding to it, you’re likely to lose some excess fat & keep it off.

3. The third part was NOT so good.

It started out OK by saying how huge the benefit is to your health if you smoke now & quit. And, although this section then UNDERstates how huge this benefit is compared to the research done on it, overall, the first part of the third section is OK.

Unfortunately, the HOW TO advice in it was NOT good.

The author recommended cutting the amount of daily cigarettes you smoke, if you smoke, by ten percent each month for ten months or reducing it by 1/12th each month for a year.

The idea being that you only make a small change each month & in 10 months or a year you would no longer smoke.

I once ran a smoker's withdrawal class based on this exact method.

It didn't work very well at all.

Here's what happened instead:

At first it was pretty good. Almost everyone could cut out about 30 or 40 percent of the smoking they normally had been doing. They just gave up the cigarettes they wanted or needed least.

So, that part is a good idea for some people as it lessens the physical addiction somewhat. And, it might then help them quit more easily with a better quitting method.

(Also, doing that; ONLY lighting cigarettes with matches & NEVER with a lighter; & taking at least 1,000 mg a day of C is slightly health-protective for people who continue to smoke.

Unfortunately smoking is horribly bad for your health it doesn’t do anywhere as much for you as quitting & staying away from second hand smoke.)

However, once people tried to cut out the cigarettes they smoked when they were most relaxed & happy, such as right after dinner or when with good friends, they seemed to find smoking less effective in fighting stress. And, hardly anyone could do it.

And, when they tried to quit the cigarettes they smoked when they were stressed or needed them for more energy or better concentration, hardly anyone could do it.

So, almost everyone dropped out when they got to that point.

Listing what reasons most motivate you to quit & why they are important to you can help.

But even better is to see a doctor who prescribes the medications that have proven effective to help people quit and who uses the best current medications.

A combination of the antidepressant, known both as Welbutrin & Zyban, and some kind of temporary nicotine replacement has a decent track record in helping people quit -- better than quitting cold turkey only & MUCH more effective than gradual withdrawal.

And, the preliminary reports I read of recently suggests that the single drug Varenicline may be about twice that effective. Apparently it does what the Zyban does but enough more effectively that the nicotine replacement is no longer needed. So, not only does it work better, it avoids leaving some people addicted to the nicotine replacement.

So, here's my suggestion as a substitute.

If you smoke, get your homocysteine level checked with a simple blood test. If it's 9.0 or higher, smoking is already harming your heart & impairing your circulation as well as accelerating your rate of aging.

(Some people who smoke don’t get lung or other cancers it’s true. But EVERYONE who smokes hurts their heart & circulation. So, take this test so you know it’s already happening to you.)

If you smoke, it's virtually certain to be far higher than 9.0. Then you'll know for a fact with no guessing that smoking is already killing you.

Then list what reasons most motivate you to quit & why they are important to you.

Then make an appointment within the next 10 days to see a doctor experienced in helping people quit with drugs & then quit entirely as soon as you have been taking the drugs long enough. The doctor can advise you how long that is.

That works for many people. There are very sophisticated studies that prove it has a much better track record than quitting cold turkey.

And it takes less than a month to do.

It definitely works FAR more often than a gradual withdrawal method.

The only two people I saw succeed with the gradual withdrawal method were so highly motivated I think they could have easily quit cold turkey & done it much faster than the withdrawal method.

Two new ways to prevent Alzheimer’s ….

Welcome to our health & self help blog.

Focus on Your Health:

In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.

Today's post: Friday, 1-12-2007

Two new ways to prevent Alzheimer’s ….

Today my email & the online health news reported two sets of research showing how to prevent Alzheimer’s disease.

1. Dharma Singh Khalsa, MD, author of Brain Longevity & expert in reversing, slowing, & preventing mental decline has an e-newsletter called The Healing Minute.

It’s mostly a promotion for the supplements he sells that he finds effective in his work.

But I read it regularly as every once in a while he has extremely important information I didn’t know before that I have seen nowhere else.

(He was my source for discovering Dr Sinatra & Dr Roberts’ new book, Reverse Heart Disease Now, which is far & away the best book yet written on the subject that I’ve seen. And, because of my reading his e-newsletter, I have now read & benefited from that book. If you have been reading my blog recently, you also saw my recent post recommending it & benefited also.)

Today, he reports this research: “….Co-Q10 was also shown to protect against the neuro-toxic effects of what's called amyloid beta peptides….”

He also says that older people have lower levels of CoQ10 & should supplement with at least 100 mg a day as it has heart protective effects & helps older people to maintain closer to youthful energy levels.

And, he’s found in his work that CoQ10 also boosts brain effectiveness in older people.

But this research finding is even more interesting. Beta amyloid seems to increase or be less filtered out in the brains of older people. If it begins to cause significant damage to the nerves in your brain, you get Alzheimer’s disease.

So this research literally suggests that if you are older & have some degree of excess beta amyloids in your brain & would have developed Alzheimer’s disease eventually, it may be that if you take 100 mg or more of CoQ10 daily, you will NOT develop the disease.

That is some of the best news I’ve read lately. And, I’ve not yet seen it anywhere else.

2. The other piece of news was in today’s online health news. So many of you may have seen it already.

Canadian research found that for people who speak two or more languages, if they develop senility, they do it five years later than those who only speak one.

Apparently, they theorize, by mastering two different kinds of language systems, your brain becomes more robust & flexible, possibly in its physical structure & nerve development, that it stands up to abuse far longer than people who only have mastered one.

Between community college courses, effective courses you can take or buy online, Berlitz, & travel to the country where the second language you are learning is spoken or reading articles in it online, learning a new language today is quite doable.

Also, in many parts of the United States it can be very useful to speak Spanish. So courses in Spanish are very easy to get here. And, you may well have an opportunity to hear it spoken or speak it.

Two ways to be less fat that work….

Welcome to our health & self help blog.

Focus on Your Health:

In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.

Today's post: Thursday, 1-11-2007

Two ways to be less fat that work….

Tuesday’s post was: Eat Low Glycemic foods for health….

1. Today, 1-11-2007, I found an article by Dr Al Sears that has important information on WHY eating protein foods & other low glycemic index foods & NOT eating high glycemic foods is so important to helping you get or stay trim.

(See: www.earlytorise.com .)

I disagree with Dr Sears on a few things; but this article was so good, I’m including it today.:

“Help your brain help you lose weight: Fill Up on Filling Foods

By Al Sears, MD

Last weekend, I went to a picnic at my son's school. (The warm weather here in Florida allows us to barbeque during the winter.) As I stood in line to get my burger, I watched the other parents piling huge mounds of food onto their paper plates. Then I watched many go back for seconds of French fries, potato salad, and homemade brownies.

This made me think of a pair of studies I read recently.

In 1984, researchers from Penn State asked the students who were participating in their study to eat their meals in the school cafeteria … and to take as much food as they wanted. Then, in 2003, researchers from Rutgers did the same thing - and they found that their subjects put 20 percent to 50 percent more food on their plates than the Penn State students did in 1984.
Clearly, people are eating more than they used to. But why?

Here's my take: It's the kind of food we're eating that makes us eat more. High-carb and highly processed foods lower sensitivity to a hormone called leptin. This is the messenger that tells your brain "I'm full." Without it, you keep eating and eating.

The easiest way to eat smaller portions is to eat foods that make you feel full sooner. So instead of trying to deny yourself, focus on foods high in protein - like lean meats, poultry, fish, and nuts. These foods trigger the leptin receptors in your brain and give you the feeling that you've "had enough."

Another winning strategy is to use the glycemic index. Foods that score below 40 keep your blood sugar and insulin at low levels. This is the key to preventing weight gain if you're going to a party or out to dinner and expect to be eating a lot.”

(For ideas on what foods work for this, see our last post for Tuesday, 1-9-2007.)

2. Another of the online health e-newsletters I get, reports research that shows that belly or abdominal fat is dangerous to your health.

And, the good news is that another study shows that the people who lost weight by eating better & taking in less calories & who also exercised regularly also lost belly fat weight.
(The group who just ate better & didn’t exercise lost weight but lost NO belly fat.)

The other surprising news was that it didn’t take that much exercise to produce this effect.

Both the groups who lost the belly fat only walked enough to burn 100 calories three days a week.

And, both the group that walked slowly for an hour & the one that walked much faster for about half an hour to burn their 100 calories lost the same amount of belly fat.

This is in addition to the research that shows that people who stay fat but exercise are MUCH healthier than those who do not exercise.

And, it’s in addition to the research that shows that people who exercise regularly each week, particularly if they include strength training, are MUCH more likely to keep off the fat they lose.

So, eat right & you’ll be less hungry & eat less calories -- which will enable you to get & stay trim.

And, make it do more for your health & be permanent by exercising regularly each week.

Welcome to our health & self help blog.

Focus on Your Health:

In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.

Today's post: Tuesday, 1-9-2007

Eat Low Glycemic foods for health….

People who do that & get enough exercise tend to be healthy & trim.

People who do the opposite, which is currently far too easy to do, virtually all are fat. And, many develop type II diabetes &/or heart disease or strokes or other cardiovascular problems.

We’ve had many posts on the multiple benefits of exercise.

This one is on low glycemic foods. Simply put, low glycemic foods are those that give you good nutrition but tend to give you a small or little rise in your blood sugar level.

High glycemic foods like refined grains or any food made from them; sugar; & high fructose corn syrup; & potatoes* often have little in the way of nutrition & tend to cause rapid increases in your blood sugar. And, if you do that too often, particularly if you don’t exercise, you get fat & sick.

*(Plain potatoes do have some nutrients; but french fries have little of those. And, even a plain baked potato is quite high in its glycemic index.)

The good news is that many low glycemic foods taste good or can be put in recipes that do.

A friend asked me for some low glycemic foods & how to look up the glycemic index of foods.

Here are the foods I emailed him:

If it has fiber & real nutrition or if its main components are protein & fat, the glycemic index of a food will be low or lower than alternatives. (Foods with only protein & fat are essentially zero as are nuts according to one doctor I read.)

So, nuts, eggs, extra virgin olive oil, wild caught salmon, sardines, exclusively grass fed beef, buffalo, etc & exclusively free range poultry all are all low or very low & tend to promote good health. (Grain fed beef is too high in omega 6 fats & saturated fat to be safe for your health to eat with any but the smallest frequency.)

Whole grains & brans tend to be moderately low; & refined grains are astonishingly high. So, it's no surprise that people who eat only whole grain & virtually no refined grain products are MUCH healthier than people who do the reverse. (Unfortunately that's still millions of people in this country.)

Barley is lower than most grains. And, I suspect Kasha, which is whole buckwheat groats, is quite low.

Beans tend to be low due to their high fiber content. Lentils are both lowest easily available beans & the most nutritious. Black-eyed peas are low. And pinto beans are moderately low. (Beans have decent plant based protein & lots of fiber.)

In fruit, cherries, plums, peaches, & nectarines are surprisingly low. Whole pears & apples are low; & surprisingly, so is unsweetened apple sauce.

Oranges moderately low; & orange juice too may be somewhat low.

Bananas are a bit high but are very good nutritionally. And, you can eat them at a meal where you eat eggs or nuts first; & the combined meal will be low in its effects.

In vegetables, potatoes are unusually high. So they are OK only in small servings & when served with lots of cheese or extra virgin olive oil to give the combination a lower effect.

Carrots are high on some charts; but they are quite high in nutrition. And, their amount of effect is actually quite low because they have so little sugars & so much fiber that something called their glycemic load is still quite low.

(Glycemic load measures the total effect of a food since a very small serving of a high glycemic food like cornflakes or potato, clearly has much less of an effect than a very large one.)

Corn is moderately high; & popcorn & cornflakes are quite high.Almost all other vegetables, particularly green ones, are low or very low.

Milk & skim milk are listed as low; but it has a lot of lactose or milk sugar; & one doctor says he has found that it increases insulin levels much the same as high glycemic foods.

Here are some high glycemic foods to avoid not in my email to my friend. (I think he already knows better than to consume them.)

Soft drinks are high whether made with high fructose corn syrup or with sugar. And, surprisingly, diet soft drinks tend to make people fat as they seem to induce people to crave sugar or high glycemic foods enough that people who drink them tend to take in too many high glycemic foods.

Here are some sources for more glycemic index information:

The Reverse Heart Disease Now book we reviewed & recommended Thursday last week has some information.

And, there are now many books on the Glycemic Index that contain information.

Or you can simply search online.

The information in this post will get you started. And, most of our Superfood list from our posts in April & May last year (2006) are low in glycemic index.

What if you have a favorite food that’s high or at least NOT low in glycemic index?

My friend had another friend who had type II diabetes who loved sourdough bread.

Here are the several ideas I emailed him that could allow his other friend to enjoy sourdough bread safely:

If his other friend does nothing else to reduce or reverse his (or her) type II diabetes & eats lots of sourdough bread that would indeed be a problem.

It may be that sourdough has a lower glycemic index than plain, soft, white bread; but plain, soft, white bread is quite high.

So, his other friend might do well to get one of those glucose blood testing devices & see what the sourdough does to his or her blood sugar level.

Many diabetics find that bread dramatically increases their blood sugar levels & does so even more than candy bars.That said, here are some ways your friend could still enjoy some sourdough bread safely.

1. Reverse the type II by getting a lot of exercise including a lot of strength training; taking supplements like alpha lipoic acid; magnesium citrate; & chromium polynicontinate & others; & eating a very low glycemic index diet otherwise.

2. Take a New Chapter CinnamonForce supplement & or a gram of a supplement called D-Ribose right before or after eating it. (Either or both will prevent the blood sugar surge otherwise likely.)

3. Have it as garlic bread made with LOTS of extra virgin olive oil & no butter.

4. Eat it last after a very low glycemic index meal instead of first or only.

5. And, there is a whole wheat sourdough bread that his friend might like that also might well be less of a problem in increase blood sugar levels due to its higher fiber content.

6. Eat it once or twice a week instead of daily.

7. Do all or most of the above.

Here’s more on WHY to eat low glycemic foods:

People who eat lots of low glycemic foods & hardly ever eat high glycemic foods or drink soft drinks who were doing the reverse before:

Have lost excess fat—sometimes a LOT;

Reversed type II diabetes;

And, reversed or at least slowed down heart disease. (That’s why there’s information on it in Dr Sinatra & Dr Roberts’s book on reversing heart disease.)


And, this all works even better with enough regular exercise.

Eat Low Glycemic foods for health….

Welcome to our health & self help blog.

Focus on Your Health:

In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.

Today's post: Tuesday, 1-9-2007

Eat Low Glycemic foods for health….

People who do that & get enough exercise tend to be healthy & trim.

People who do the opposite, which is currently far too easy to do, virtually all are fat. And, many develop type II diabetes &/or heart disease or strokes or other cardiovascular problems.

We’ve had many posts on the multiple benefits of exercise.

This one is on low glycemic foods. Simply put, low glycemic foods are those that give you good nutrition but tend to give you a small or little rise in your blood sugar level.

High glycemic foods like refined grains or any food made from them; sugar; & high fructose corn syrup; & potatoes* often have little in the way of nutrition & tend to cause rapid increases in your blood sugar. And, if you do that too often, particularly if you don’t exercise, you get fat & sick.

*(Plain potatoes do have some nutrients; but french fries have little of those. And, even a plain baked potato is quite high in its glycemic index.)

The good news is that many low glycemic foods taste good or can be put in recipes that do.

A friend asked me for some low glycemic foods & how to look up the glycemic index of foods.

Here are the foods I emailed him:

If it has fiber & real nutrition or if its main components are protein & fat, the glycemic index of a food will be low or lower than alternatives.

(Foods with only protein & fat are essentially zero as are nuts according to one doctor I read.)So, nuts, eggs, extra virgin olive oil, wild caught salmon, sardines, exclusively grass fed beef, buffalo, etc & exclusively free range poultry all are all low or very low & tend to promote good health.

(Grain fed beef is too high in omega 6 fats & saturated fat to be safe for your health to eat with any but the smallest frequency.)

Whole grains & brans tend to be moderately low; & refined grains are astonishingly high. So, it's no surprise that people who eat only whole grain & virtually no refined grain products are MUCH healthier than people who do the reverse. (Unfortunately that's still millions of people in this country.)

Barley is lower than most grains. And, I suspect Kasha, which is whole buckwheat groats, is quite low.

Beans tend to be low due to their high fiber content. Lentils are both lowest easily available beans & the most nutritious. Black-eyed peas are low. And pinto beans are moderately low. (Beans have decent plant based protein & lots of fiber.)

In fruit, cherries, plums, peaches, & nectarines are surprisingly low. Whole pears & apples are low; & surprisingly, so is unsweetened apple sauce.

Oranges moderately low; & orange juice too may be somewhat low.

Bananas are a bit high but are very good nutritionally. And, you can eat them at a meal where you eat eggs or nuts first; & the combined meal will be low in its effects.

In vegetables, potatoes are unusually high. So they are OK only in small servings & when served with lots of cheese or extra virgin olive oil to give the combination a lower effect.

Carrots are high on some charts; but they are quite high in nutrition. And, their amount of effect is actually quite low because they have so little sugars & so much fiber that something called their glycemic load is still quite low.

(Glycemic load measures the total effect of a food since a very small serving of a high glycemic food like cornflakes or potato, clearly has much less of an effect than a very large one.)

Corn is moderately high; & popcorn & cornflakes are quite high.Almost all other vegetables, particularly green ones, are low or very low.

Milk & skim milk are listed as low; but it has a lot of lactose or milk sugar; & one doctor says he has found that it increases insulin levels much the same as high glycemic foods.

Here are some high glycemic foods to avoid not in my email to my friend. (I think he already knows better than to consume them.)

Soft drinks are high whether made with high fructose corn syrup or with sugar. And, surprisingly, diet soft drinks tend to make people fat as they seem to induce people to crave sugar or high glycemic foods enough that people who drink them tend to take in too many high glycemic foods.

Here are some sources for more glycemic index information:

The Reverse Heart Disease Now book we reviewed & recommended Thursday last week has some information.

And, there are now many books on the Glycemic Index that contain information.

Or you can simply search online.

The information in this post will get you started. And, most of our Superfood list from our posts in April & May last year (2006) are low in glycemic index.

What if you have a favorite food that’s high or at least NOT low in glycemic index?

My friend had another friend who had type II diabetes who loved sourdough bread.

Here are the several ideas I emailed him that could allow his other friend to enjoy sourdough bread safely:

If his other friend does nothing else to reduce or reverse his (or her) type II diabetes & eats lots of sourdough bread that would indeed be a problem.

It may be that sourdough has a lower glycemic index than plain, soft, white bread; but plain, soft, white bread is quite high.

So, your friend might do well to get one of those glucose blood testing devices & see what the sourdough does to his or her blood sugar level.

Many diabetics find that bread dramatically increases their blood sugar levels & does so even more than candy bars.

That said, here are some ways your friend could still enjoy some sourdough bread safely.

1. Reverse the type II by getting a lot of exercise including a lot of strength training; taking supplements like alpha lipoic acid; magnesium citrate; & chromium polynicontinate & others; & eating a very low glycemic index diet otherwise.

2. Take a New Chapter CinnamonForce supplement & or a gram of a supplement called D-Ribose right before or after eating it. (Either or both will prevent the blood sugar surge otherwise likely.)

3. Have it as garlic bread made with LOTS of extra virgin olive oil & no butter.

4. Eat it last after a very low glycemic index meal instead of first or only.

5. And, there is a whole wheat sourdough bread that his friend might like that also might well be less of a problem in increase blood sugar levels due to its higher fiber content.

6. Eat it once or twice a week instead of daily.

7. Do all or most of the above.

Here’s more on WHY to eat low glycemic foods:

People who eat lots of low glycemic foods & hardly ever eat high glycemic foods or drink soft drinks who were doing the reverse before:

Have lost excess fat—sometimes a LOT;

Reversed type II diabetes;

And, reversed or at least slowed down heart disease. (That’s why there’s information on it in Dr Sinatra & Dr Roberts’s book on reversing heart disease.)


And, this all works even better with enough regular exercise.

”Reverse Heart Disease Now” <<<

Welcome to our health & self help blog.

Focus on Your Health:

In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.

Today's post: Thursday, 1-4-2007

”Reverse Heart Disease Now” <<<

This new book has our highest recommendation:

“Reverse Heart Disease Now: Stop Deadly Cardiovascular Plaque Before It's Too Late” by Sinatra, James C. M.D. Roberts, and Martin Zucker

It’s by two cardiologists who decided they wanted to help heart patients get better instead of only doing emergency repairs on patients. They wanted to stop doing emergency repairs on patients who they had previously worked on—which was all too common.

Dr Sinatra wrote a previous book on lowering high blood pressure which includes several successful strategies besides drugs. That book is mostly good. But it does miss a few points.

However, by continuing to do research; trying the more promising things with his patients; & learning from those of his patients who found things that seemed to work, his knowledge has grown substantially.

To write this book, he combined forces with Dr James Roberts, who had been doing very similar work but who had knowledge in areas Dr Sinatra did not & vice versa.

Between them, they have created a marvelous resource for anyone who is battling heart or cardiovascular disease & for anyone who wants to avoid it.

They include almost every effective approach known. They explain how they test to see which of these methods a given patient needs most. They credit the people who pioneered their methods. And, they even provide some insight into why these methods work.

I particularly like that they use whichever medical or non-medical techniques each of their particular patients needs.

Do you take statin drugs? If so, do you have less energy than you used to have or get tired more easily or have other side effects? If so, not only can you read this book, if necessary, you can get a copy for your doctor.

Dr Sinatra & Dr Roberts do use statin drugs for some of their sicker, more at risk, patients. But, they use other methods for those who are in better shape. And, when they do prescribe statins, they also prescribe the use of supplements that minimize or prevent the side effects.

Has have their methods worked? Yes. They hardly ever have any patients they have to do emergency surgery on a second time where it was quite common for each of them before. And, the quality of life for their patients has improved dramatically. For example, they’ve done well eliminating or greatly reducing angina in patients who had significant pain before using these methods.