The Many Health Benefits Of Garlic
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The Many Health Benefits of Garlic
We’re quite confident you already know what garlic is, so we’re going to leap straight in there with some science today:
First, let’s talk about allicin
Allicin is a compound in garlic that gives most of its health benefits. A downside of allicin is that it’s not very stable, so what this means is:
- Garlic is best fresh—allicin breaks down soon after garlic is cut/crushed
- So while doing the paperwork isn’t fun, buying it as bulbs is better than buying it as granules or similar
- Allicin also breaks down somewhat in cooking, so raw garlic is best
- Our philosophy is: still use it in cooking as well; just use more!
- Supplements (capsule form etc) use typically use extracts and potency varies (from not great to actually very good)
Read more about that:
- Short-term heating reduces the anti-inflammatory effects of fresh raw garlic extracts
- Allicin Bioavailability and Bioequivalence from Garlic Supplements and Garlic Foods
Now, let’s talk benefits…
Benefits to heart health
Garlic has been found to be as effective as the drug Atenolol at reducing blood pressure:
It also lowers LDL (bad cholesterol):
Benefits to the gut
We weren’t even looking for this, but as it turns out, as an add-on to the heart benefits…
Benefits to the immune system
Whether against the common cold or bringing out the heavy guns, garlic is a booster:
- Preventing the common cold with a garlic supplement: a double-blind, placebo-controlled survey
- Supplementation with aged garlic extract improves both NK and γδ-T cell function and reduces the severity of cold and flu symptoms: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled nutrition intervention
Benefits to the youthfulness of body and brain
Garlic is high in antioxidants that, by virtue of reducing oxidative stress, help slow aging. This effect, combined with the cholesterol and blood pressure benefits, means it may also reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia:
- Antioxidant health effects of aged garlic extract
- Effects of garlic consumption on plasma and erythrocyte antioxidant parameters in elderly subjects
- Garlic reduces heart disease and dementia risk
There are more benefits too…
That’s all we have time to dive into study-wise today, but for the visually-inclined, here are yet more benefits to garlic (at a rate of 3–4 cloves per day):
An incredible awesome recipe using lots of garlic:
- Take small potatoes (still in their skins), cut in half
- Add enough peeled cloves of garlic so that you have perhaps a 1:10 ratio of garlic to potato by mass
- Boil (pressure-cooking is ideal) until soft, and drain
- Keeping them in the pan, add a lashing of olive oil, and any additional seasonings per your preference (consider black pepper, rosemary, thyme, parsley)
- Put a lid on the pan, and holding it closed, shake the pan vigorously
- Note: if you didn’t leave the skins on, or you chopped much larger potatoes smaller instead of cutting in half, the potatoes will break up into a rough mash now. This is actually also fine and still tastes (and honestly, looks) great, but it is different, so just be aware, so that you get the outcome you want.
- The garlic, which—unlike the potatoes—didn’t have a skin to hold it together, will now have melted over the potatoes like butter
You can serve like this (it’s delicious already) or finish up in the oven or air-fryer or under the grill, if you prefer a roasted style dish (an amazing option too).
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Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers – by Dr. Robert M. Sapolsky
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The book does kick off with a section that didn’t age well—he talks of the stress induced globally by the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918, and how that kind of thing just doesn’t happen any more. Today, we have much less existentially dangerous stressors!
However, the fact we went and had another pandemic really only adds weight to the general arguments of the book, rather than detracting.
We are consistently beset by “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” as Shakespeare would put it, and there’s a reason (or twenty) why many people go grocery-shopping with the cortisol levels of someone being hunted for sport.
So, why don’t zebras get ulcers, as they actually are hunted for food?
They don’t have rent to pay or a mortgage, they don’t have taxes, or traffic, or a broken washing machine, or a project due in the morning. Their problems come one at a time. They have a useful stress response to a stressful situation (say, being chased by lions), and when the danger is over, they go back to grazing. They have time to recover.
For us, we are (usually) not being chased by lions. But we have everything else, constantly, around the clock. So, how to fix that?
Dr. Sapolsky comprehensively describes our physiological responses to stress in quite different terms than many. By reframing stress responses as part of the homeostatic system—trying to get the body back into balance—we find a solution, or rather: ways to help our bodies recover.
The style is “pop-science” and is very accessible for the lay reader while still clearly coming from a top-level academic who is neck-deep in neuroendocrinological research. Best of both worlds!
Bottom line: if you try to take very day at a time, but sometimes several days gang up on you at once, and you’d like to learn more about what happens inside you as a result and how to fix that, this book is for you!
Click here to check out “Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers” and give yourself a break!
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How much weight do you actually need to lose? It might be a lot less than you think
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If you’re one of the one in three Australians whose New Year’s resolution involved losing weight, it’s likely you’re now contemplating what weight-loss goal you should actually be working towards.
But type “setting a weight loss goal” into any online search engine and you’ll likely be left with more questions than answers.
Sure, the many weight-loss apps and calculators available will make setting this goal seem easy. They’ll typically use a body mass index (BMI) calculator to confirm a “healthy” weight and provide a goal weight based on this range.
Your screen will fill with trim-looking influencers touting diets that will help you drop ten kilos in a month, or ads for diets, pills and exercise regimens promising to help you effortlessly and rapidly lose weight.
Most sales pitches will suggest you need to lose substantial amounts of weight to be healthy – making weight loss seem an impossible task. But the research shows you don’t need to lose a lot of weight to achieve health benefits.
Using BMI to define our target weight is flawed
We’re a society fixated on numbers. So it’s no surprise we use measurements and equations to score our weight. The most popular is BMI, a measure of our body weight-to-height ratio.
BMI classifies bodies as underweight, normal (healthy) weight, overweight or obese and can be a useful tool for weight and health screening.
But it shouldn’t be used as the single measure of what it means to be a healthy weight when we set our weight-loss goals. This is because it:
- fails to consider two critical factors related to body weight and health – body fat percentage and distribution
- does not account for significant differences in body composition based on gender, ethnicity and age.
How does losing weight benefit our health?
Losing just 5–10% of our body weight – between 6 and 12kg for someone weighing 120kg – can significantly improve our health in four key ways.
1. Reducing cholesterol
Obesity increases the chances of having too much low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol – also known as bad cholesterol – because carrying excess weight changes how our bodies produce and manage lipoproteins and triglycerides, another fat molecule we use for energy.
Having too much bad cholesterol and high triglyceride levels is not good, narrowing our arteries and limiting blood flow, which increases the risk of heart disease, heart attack and stroke.
But research shows improvements in total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol and triglyceride levels are evident with just 5% weight loss.
2. Lowering blood pressure
Our blood pressure is considered high if it reads more than 140/90 on at least two occasions.
Excess weight is linked to high blood pressure in several ways, including changing how our sympathetic nervous system, blood vessels and hormones regulate our blood pressure.
Essentially, high blood pressure makes our heart and blood vessels work harder and less efficiently, damaging our arteries over time and increasing our risk of heart disease, heart attack and stroke.
Losing weight can lower your blood pressure.
Prostock-studio/ShutterstockLike the improvements in cholesterol, a 5% weight loss improves both systolic blood pressure (the first number in the reading) and diastolic blood pressure (the second number).
A meta-analysis of 25 trials on the influence of weight reduction on blood pressure also found every kilo of weight loss improved blood pressure by one point.
3. Reducing risk for type 2 diabetes
Excess body weight is the primary manageable risk factor for type 2 diabetes, particularly for people carrying a lot of visceral fat around the abdomen (belly fat).
Carrying this excess weight can cause fat cells to release pro-inflammatory chemicals that disrupt how our bodies regulate and use the insulin produced by our pancreas, leading to high blood sugar levels.
Type 2 diabetes can lead to serious medical conditions if it’s not carefully managed, including damaging our heart, blood vessels, major organs, eyes and nervous system.
Research shows just 7% weight loss reduces risk of developing type 2 diabetes by 58%.
4. Reducing joint pain and the risk of osteoarthritis
Carrying excess weight can cause our joints to become inflamed and damaged, making us more prone to osteoarthritis.
Observational studies show being overweight doubles a person’s risk of developing osteoarthritis, while obesity increases the risk fourfold.
Small amounts of weight loss alleviate this stress on our joints. In one study each kilogram of weight loss resulted in a fourfold decrease in the load exerted on the knee in each step taken during daily activities.
Losing weight eases stress on joints.
Shutterstock/Rostislav_SedlacekFocus on long-term habits
If you’ve ever tried to lose weight but found the kilos return almost as quickly as they left, you’re not alone.
An analysis of 29 long-term weight-loss studies found participants regained more than half of the weight lost within two years. Within five years, they regained more than 80%.
When we lose weight, we take our body out of its comfort zone and trigger its survival response. It then counteracts weight loss, triggering several physiological responses to defend our body weight and “survive” starvation.
Just as the problem is evolutionary, the solution is evolutionary too. Successfully losing weight long-term comes down to:
losing weight in small manageable chunks you can sustain, specifically periods of weight loss, followed by periods of weight maintenance, and so on, until you achieve your goal weight
making gradual changes to your lifestyle to ensure you form habits that last a lifetime.
Setting a goal to reach a healthy weight can feel daunting. But it doesn’t have to be a pre-defined weight according to a “healthy” BMI range. Losing 5–10% of our body weight will result in immediate health benefits.
At the Boden Group, Charles Perkins Centre, we are studying the science of obesity and running clinical trials for weight loss. You can register here to express your interest.
Nick Fuller, Charles Perkins Centre Research Program Leader, University of Sydney
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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The Coffee-Cortisol Connection, And Two Ways To Tweak It For Health
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Health opinions on coffee vary from “it’s an invigorating, healthful drink” to “it will leave you a shaking frazzled wreck”. So, what’s the truth and can we enjoy it healthily? Dr. Alan Mandell weighs in:
Enjoy it, but watch out!
Dr. Mandell is speaking only for caffeinated coffee in this video, and to this end, he’s conflating the health effects of coffee and caffeine. A statistically reasonable imprecision, since most people drink coffee with its natural caffeine in, but we’ll make some adjustment to his comments below, to disambiguate which statements are true for coffee generally, and which are true for caffeine:
- Drinking
coffeecaffeine first thing in the morning may not be ideal due to dehydration from overnight water loss. Coffeecaffeine is a diuretic, which means an increase in urination, thus further dehydrating the body.- Coffee contains great antioxidants, which are of course beneficial for the health in general.
- Cortisol, the body’s stress hormone, is generally at its peak in the morning. This is, in and of itself, good and correct—it’s how we wake up.
Coffeecaffeine consumption raises cortisol levels even more, leading to increased alertness and physical readiness, but it is possible to have too much of a good thing, and in this case, problems can arise because…- Elevated cortisol from early
coffeecaffeine drinking can build tolerance, leading to the need for morecoffeecaffeine over time. - It’s better, therefore, to defer drinking
coffeecaffeine until later in the morning when cortisol levels naturally drop. - All of this means that drinking
coffeecaffeine first thing can disrupt the neuroendocrine system, leading to fatigue, depression, and general woe. - Hydrate first thing in the morning before consuming
coffeecaffeine to keep the body balanced and healthy.
What you can see from this is that coffee and caffeine are not, in fact, interchangeable words, but the basic message is clear and correct: while a little spike of cortisol in the morning is good, natural, and even necessary, a big spike is none of those things, and caffeine can cause a big spike, and since for most people caffeine is easy to build tolerance to, there will indeed consistently be a need for more, worsening the problem.
In terms of hydration, it’s good to have water (or better yet, herbal tea) on one’s nightstand to drink when one wakes up.
If coffee is an important morning ritual for you, consider finding a good decaffeinated version for at least your first cup (this writer is partial to Lavazza’s “Dek Intenso”—which is not the same as their main decaf line, by the way, so do hold out for the “Dek Intenso” if you want to try my recommendation).
Decaffeinated coffee is hydrating and will not cause a cortisol spike (unless for some reason you find coffee as a concept very stressful in which case, yes, the stressor will cause a stress response).
Anyway, for more on all of this, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
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Dogs Paired With Providers at Hospitals Help Ease Staff and Patient Stress
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DENVER — Outside HCA HealthONE Rose medical center, the snow is flying. Inside, on the third floor, there’s a flurry of activity within the labor and delivery unit.
“There’s a lot of action up here. It can be very stressful at times,” said Kristina Fraser, an OB-GYN in blue scrubs.
Nurses wheel a very pregnant mom past.
“We’re going to bring a baby into this world safely,” Fraser said, “and off we go.”
She said she feels ready in part due to a calming moment she had just a few minutes earlier with some canine colleagues.
A pair of dogs, tails wagging, had come by a nearby nursing station, causing about a dozen medical professionals to melt into a collective puddle of affection. A yellow Lab named Peppi showered Fraser in nuzzles and kisses. “I don’t know if a human baby smells as good as that puppy breath!” Fraser had said as her colleagues laughed.
The dogs aren’t visitors. They work here, too, specifically for the benefit of the staff. “I feel like that dog just walks on and everybody takes a big deep breath and gets down on the ground and has a few moments of just decompressing,” Fraser said. “It’s great. It’s amazing.”
Hospital staffers who work with the dogs say there is virtually no bite risk with the carefully trained Labradors, the preferred breed for this work.
The dogs are kept away from allergic patients and washed regularly to prevent germs from spreading, and people must wash their hands before and after petting them.
Doctors and nurses are facing a growing mental health crisis driven by their experiences at work. They and other health care colleagues face high rates of depression, anxiety, stress, suicidal ideation, and burnout. Nearly half of health workers reported often feeling burned out in 2022, an increase from 2018, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And the percentage of health care workers who reported harassment at work more than doubled over that four-year period. Advocates for the presence of dogs in hospitals see the animals as one thing that can help.
That includes Peppi’s handler, Susan Ryan, an emergency medicine physician at Rose.
Ryan said years working as an emergency room doctor left her with symptoms of PTSD. “I just was messed up and I knew it,” said Ryan, who isolated more at home and didn’t want to engage with friends. “I shoved it all in. I think we all do.”
She said doctors and other providers can be good at hiding their struggles, because they have to compartmentalize. “How else can I go from a patient who had a cardiac arrest, deal with the family members telling them that, and go to a room where another person is mad that they’ve had to wait 45 minutes for their ear pain? And I have to flip that switch.”
To cope with her symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, Ryan started doing therapy with horses. But she couldn’t have a horse in her backyard, so she got a Labrador.
Ryan received training from a national service dog group called Canine Companions, becoming the first doctor trained by the group to have a facility dog in an emergency room. Canine Companions has graduated more than 8,000 service dogs.
The Rose medical center gave Ryan approval to bring a dog to work during her ER shifts. Ryan’s colleagues said they are delighted that a dog is part of their work life.
“When I have a bad day at work and I come to Rose and Peppi is here, my day’s going to be made better,” EMT Jasmine Richardson said. “And if I have a patient who’s having a tough day, Peppi just knows how to light up the room.”
Nursing supervisor Eric Vaillancourt agreed, calling Peppi “joyful.”
Ryan had another dog, Wynn, working with her during the height of the pandemic. She said she thinks Wynn made a huge difference. “It saved people,” she said. “We had new nurses that had never seen death before, and now they’re seeing a covid death. And we were worried sick we were dying.”
She said her hospital system has lost a couple of physicians to suicide in the past two years, which HCA confirmed to KFF Health News and NPR. Ryan hopes the canine connection can help with trauma. “Anything that brings you back to the present time helps ground you again. A dog can be that calming influence,” she said. “You can get down on the ground, pet them, and you just get calm.”
Ryan said research has shown the advantages. For example, one review of dozens of original studies on human-animal interactions found benefits for a variety of conditions including behavioral and mood issues and physical symptoms of stress.
Rose’s president and CEO, Casey Guber, became such a believer in the canine connection he got his own trained dog to bring to the hospital, a black Lab-retriever mix named Ralphie.
She wears a badge: Chief Dog Officer.
Guber said she’s a big morale booster. “Phenomenal,” he said. “It is not uncommon to see a surgeon coming down to our administration office and rolling on the ground with Ralphie, or one of our nurses taking Ralphie out for a walk in the park.”
This article is from a partnership that includes CPR News, NPR, and KFF Health News.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.
Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free Morning Briefing.
This article first appeared on KFF Health News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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Parsnips vs Potatoes – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing parsnips to potatoes, we picked the parsnips.
Why?
To be more specific, we’re looking at russet potatoes, and in both cases we’re looking at cooked without fat or salt, skin on. In other words, the basic nutritional values of these plants in edible form, without adding anything. With this in mind, once we get to the root of things, there’s a clear winner:
Looking at the macros first, potatoes have more carbs while parsnips have more fiber. Potatoes do have more protein too, but given the small numbers involved when it comes to protein we don’t think this is enough of a plus to outweigh the extra fiber in the parsnips.
In the category of vitamins, again a champion emerges: parsnips have more of vitamins B1, B2, B5, B9, C, E, and K, while potatoes have more of vitamins B3, B6, and choline. So, a 7:3 win for parsnips.
When it comes to minerals, parsnips have more calcium copper, manganese, selenium, and zinc, while potatoes have more iron and potassium. Potatoes do also have more sodium, but for most people most of the time, this is not a plus, healthwise. Disregarding the sodium, this category sees a 5:2 win for parsnips.
In short: as with most starchy vegetables, enjoy both in moderation if you feel so inclined, but if you’re picking one, then parsnips are the nutritionally best choice here.
Want to learn more?
You might like to read:
- Why You’re Probably Not Getting Enough Fiber (And How To Fix It)
- Should You Go Light Or Heavy On Carbs?
Take care!
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Ideal Blood Pressure Numbers Explained
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It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
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In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small
❝Maybe I missed it but the study on blood pressure did it say what the 2 numbers should read ideally?❞
We linked it at the top of the article rather than including it inline, as we were short on space (and there was a chart rather than a “these two numbers” quick answer), but we have a little more space today, so:
Category Systolic (mm Hg) Diastolic (mm Hg) Normal < 120 AND < 80 Elevated 120 – 129 AND < 80 Stage 1 – High Blood Pressure 130 – 139 OR 80 – 89 Stage 2 – High Blood Pressure 140 or higher OR 90 or higher Hypertensive Crisis Above 180 AND/OR Above 120 To oversimplify for a “these two numbers” answer, under 120/80 is generally considered good, unless it is under 90/60, in which case that becomes hypotension.
Hypotension, the blood pressure being too low, means your organs may not get enough oxygen and if they don’t, they will start shutting down.
To give you an idea how serious this, this is the closed-circuit equivalent of the hypovolemic shock that occurs when someone is bleeding out onto the floor. Technically, bleeding to death also results in low blood pressure, of course, hence the similarity.
So: just a little under 120/80 is great.
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