Q: Would you review again why we should eat complex carbohydrates and define what they are? Thank you.
Category: C
Fast Food Favorites: Chickpeas
Chickpeas (also called garbanzo beans–read more about them here) are a potential meal in a can. Plus, they’re one of the truly good carbohydrates. Because they’re taken up slowly and steadily by your body, they have a stabilizing effect your blood sugar and your mood, keeping you energized and elevating your feel-good serotonin.
Can You Lower Cholesterol with Supplements?
The answer, like many of my courageous medical comments, is a firm “It depends…”
Most of my patients aren’t thrilled when I reach for a prescription pad, especially when it’s for a drug they might have to take for the rest of their lives. Consider also the dollar signs that appear in the eyes of pharmaceutical industry executives if you are, say, 40 years old and your doctor writes you a Lipitor prescription to lower your bad cholesterol. If you live to be 80, over your life span you’ll be spending about $50,000 on this drug.
Your Colonoscopy
Yes, yours.
If you’re under 50, you have my blessing to press the DELETE button and move on to your next message. Readers in their mid-40s might want to keep reading. Your time is coming.
Cancer Prevention Clip ‘n Save
This month’s issue of the International Journal of Cancer published a report from the Leicester Royal Infirmary in which researchers actually tracked the cancer prevention benefits of certain foods. They were interested in a specific group I’ve mentioned in these Health Tips several times: polyphenols, like those found in green tea.
The Night Shift and Breast Cancer
For years, doctors have puzzled over why women who work the night shift are more likely to get breast cancer. Now they think they’ve come up with an explanation, and it has to do with melatonin–the same melatonin sold to promote sleep.
Preventing Cancer with One Good Choice
You can prevent cancer by eating more vegetables, and specifically more cruciferous vegetables, including broccoli, cauliflower, kale, and Brussels sprouts.
More than half of all cancers in US adults are likely caused by poor diet, and many others develop because we’re exposed to a gruesome soup of environmental toxins in our food, air, and water.
Supplements I Take: Acetyl-L-Carnitine
I ask every new patient what prescription medications and supplements she takes. Occasionally, someone turns the tables and asks me what my daily supplement regimen consists of.
Is Vitamin C Worthwhile?
I’m asked this question a lot.
You’d think the controversy would be over by now. Among doctors who take vitamins regularly (now the majority), vitamin C is always included.
Reducing Your Risk of Ovarian Cancer
Ovarian cancer frightens women, and with good reason. More than 22,000 will be diagnosed with it this year–more than cancer of the uterus and cervix combined–and ultimately over 16,000 will die from it.
Cancer and Vitamin D
If I caught your attention with that headline, why not review your supplements right now and add up the total number of units of vitamin D you’re taking every day.
Red Grapefruit and Cholesterol
Here’s a quick health tip if your cholesterol is on the high side. Make your daily breakfast a bowl of oatmeal and one red grapefruit.
You’re likely already aware of oatmeal’s cholesterol-lowering effects, but those of red grapefruit are the result of newly published study.