Med Health News

Tag: dark chocolate

  • 5 Healthier Presents for Mother’s Day

    5 Healthier Presents for Mother’s Day

    It’s time to show how much you appreciate your mom this Sunday! If you’re still choosing a Mother’s Day present, here are some healthier options.

    Showing your love for your mom on Mother’s Day means different things for different people. Some treat their moms out to dinner while others simply send flowers through the mail. Other people show their appreciation to the fullest by treating the day just like a birthday – they throw a party and buy their mom a real present.

    Whether it’s a casual or a special present, here are healthy choices you can give your mom this Mother’s Day:

    1. Provence Roses

    The Provence rose (Rose de Mai) is a beautiful red-pink rose. Its sweet fragrance is made up of healing compounds that have been found to lower pain and inflammation. Because of these healing properties, these flowers are used in most essential oils. Of course, these benefits are stronger if you inhale the flower’s concentrated essential oil, but the natural flowers themselves will fill the surrounding air with a lovely, healing scent.

    2. Lavender

    Lavender is pretty common in most flower bouquets. These calming magenta flowers provide a nice, soft contrast to the vibrant reds and whites of other flowers. These beautifully cone-shaped flowers also release healing scents that have been found to relieve anxiety and boost memory. They also have been found to treat Alzheimer’s and lower inflammation in your nervous system. But these neuroprotective effects are strongest when inhaling the concentrated essential oil form.




    3. Assorted Raw Nuts

    Nuts are a clean source of protein. They’re considered superfoods because they’re antioxidant-rich and rich in many minerals and vitamins. And if that’s not good enough for you – they’re also a great source of omega-3 fatty acids! Here are a few of the best ones you can buy your mom:

    Brazil nuts. Brazil nuts are rich in selenium, which your body needs to make vital antioxidant enzymes. Selenium also cancels out any mercury in your system from eating fish or environmental exposure. But you can only eat up to four or five a day or you might risk selenium poisoning.

    Walnuts. Walnuts are renowned for their omega-3 fatty acids content. Vegans often substitute fish for walnuts as their source for these fish oils. They’re also rich in manganese and copper, which are two other rare minerals your body needs.

    Almonds. Almonds are protein-rich and most prefer their melt-in-your-mouth flavor to walnuts. Although almonds offer more nutritional value than meats and other foods, they’re subpar when compared to other nuts’ nutritional content. One serving also only offers about 5 milligrams of omega-3 fatty acids. But almonds do shine through when it comes to vitamin E – one serving meets 125 percent of your daily required intake.

    If you snack on these nuts with some veggies, researchers found you’ll absorb more of the vegetables’ carotenoids because consuming fats with these disease-preventing antioxidants improves their absorption in your gut.

    4. Dark Chocolate

    Dark chocolate has high cocoa content, which has a wealth of benefits. Researchers found that regularly enjoying dark chocolate lowers your risk for cardiovascular disease by 5.4 percent. It’s also been found to help you lose weight if you eat it five times every week. Best of all, eating dark chocolate boosts your brain power for up to three hours and gives you an exhilarating high.

    5. Earthing Shoes

    If you’re the kind that treats Mother’s Day the same as your mom’s birthday, then you can gift her earthing shoes instead of expensive high heels that are bad for her foot and back health.

    As the name implies, earthing is when you stand on the earth. The earth has to be connected to the ground with nothing blocking it off in-between. For example, standing on soil in the middle of your living room isn’t earthing, but standing on your lawn’s grass works as long as your whole lawn isn’t encased by an artificial barrier in the ground below.

    Researchers found that when you earth, the Earth’s natural electrons flow into your body and neutralize any disease-causing free radicals. They also found that earthing regularly lowers overall inflammation and boosts wound healing significantly by neutralizing free radicals that harm your tissues and slow healing. Studies also show that earthing regularly improves your sleep quality, helps relieve anxiety by normalizing your nervous system, and also lowers any overall pain. Participants also experienced lower overall blood pressure when instructed to earth regularly.

    To confirm the phenomenon, they attached electrodes to runners who ran barefoot and those who ran with sneakers on. The barefoot runners had a lower overall charge than those who wore rubber sneakers. Since most footwear have rubber soles, it insulates your body from the Earth’s healing electrons.

    Doctors don’t advise walking barefoot outdoors because there are parasites that can enter through your soles’ pores. Sharp rocks and other protruding debris can also cut your feet’s skin. But wearing shoes that don’t block the flow of electrons allows you to earth safely while running or enjoying a walk outdoors. You can buy special earthing shoes, which can be pricey. You can also choose footwear that are made of material that don’t insulate electricity (like wood and cloth).

    This Mother’s Day choose one of these presents to show your mom your appreciation while boosting her health at the same time. These will help keep her heart, brain, and the rest of her body healthy!

  • Why Doctors Want You to Eat Chocolate This Valentine’s Day

    Why Doctors Want You to Eat Chocolate This Valentine’s Day

    Valentine’s Day is hallmarked by the giving of chocolates to your romantic interest. Medical and scientific research reveal that gifting chocolates is not simply an act of affection. It turns out that regularly consuming chocolate prevents cardiovascular disease, promotes weight loss, and aids in meditation. Chocolate is no longer a junk food – to the contrary, it’s a holistic treat that supports the mind and body.

    Chocolate was first introduced into Europe soon after Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortés came upon the Maya and Aztecs and observed them preparing cacao drinks. Writings from 1556 contain a passage written by an anonymous Spanish conquistador describing how cacao seeds are ground into powder and mixed methodically to create a foaming liquid.

    The anonymous conquistador wrote,

    This [foaming] drink is the healthiest thing, and the greatest sustenance of anything you could drink in the world, because he who drinks a cup of this liquid, no matter how far he walks, can go a whole day without eating anything else.

    Of course the original Mayan and Aztec cacao drinks didn’t contain sugar and the tasty additives of modern-day chocolate products. Even so, what that conquistador wrote half a millennium ago is surprisingly true of cacao and today’s dark chocolate products according to scientific experts and physicians.

    Dark Chocolate Is Good for Your Heart

    Regularly consuming dark chocolate increases artery flexibility while also decreasing blood vessel leukocyte adhesion. Arterial stiffness and long-term buildup of white blood cells stuck to blood vessel walls are two significant factors in atherosclerosis.

    In fact an 11-year study revealed that people who regularly consume up to 3.5 ounces of chocolate daily experience a 5.4 percent decreased risk of developing cardiovascular disease.

    Furthermore according to Professor Larry Stevens of Northern Arizona University, dark chocolate is a vasodilator and regularly consuming it lowers blood pressure for the long term. According to findings by Louisiana State University, one explanation for this is that your gut bacteria convert cacao into compounds that protect blood vessel cells from stress and reduce inflammation.

    Chocolate Helps You Lose Weight

    Regularly munching on any kind of chocolate, regardless of cacao content, leads to weight loss. Research by Dr. Beatrice Golomb, an associate professor of medicine at the University of California, San Diego revealed that people who ate chocolate five times a week experienced weight loss without an increase in physical exercise. She states that a “5-foot tall woman weighing about 120 pounds… was likely to be about five pounds lighter if she was a frequent eater of chocolate.”

    According to Joshua Lambert of Penn State University, one factor contributing to chocolate’s weight loss effects is that some specific polyphenols found in cacao may inhibit pancreatic lipase, which is the enzyme responsible for digesting dietary fat. Thus, these polyphenols could be preventing the fat in commercial chocolate from being digested and absorbed into the body.

    Another contributing factor included in Louisiana State University’s findings is that your gut bacteria convert cacao’s fiber into short chain fatty acids, which make you feel full after you absorb them.

    Chocolate Helps You Meditate

    Chocolate Mindfulness meditation is an increasingly popular kind of meditation. It involves making you more aware of your senses by taking a piece of chocolate and deeply inhaling the chocolate’s aroma, staring at the chocolate and examining it deeply; and finally placing the chocolate into your mouth and trying to notice each one of its 300 flavors while playing with it with your tongue and allowing it to melt. Then you repeat the process until all the chocolate is consumed, and while doing so you’re gently keeping your mind focused on the chocolate, shepherding your focus back when it wanders away.

    Professor Stevens’ research sheds light on why this meditation technique is effective. He conducted a study involving 122 participants between 18 to 25 years old consuming confection containing 60 percent cacao. Brain activity was monitored via EEG and blood pressure was recorded.

    When we asked him via email, he responded that the 60 percent cacao group experienced an increase in alpha brain waves, which is one of the desired meditative states. The group also experienced an increase in beta brain waves. He stated that increasing alpha and beta waves should produce “a more alert, attentive, and calm state.” Being calm but attentive is key for meditation.

    However the participants experienced a short-term increase in blood pressure when consuming the 60 percent cacao. The 60 percent cacao confection still lowers blood pressure in the long-term, but the short-term increase in blood pressure might be troubling for some people, like those with hypertension.

    Thus, Professor Stevens introduced an amino acid naturally found in green tea, L-theanine, which lowers blood pressure, to the confection and administered it to another group of participants. This group experienced an immediate drop in blood pressure rather than the short-term increase experienced by the 60 percent cacao group.

    He reports in his email that this 60 percent cacao plus L-theanine group also experienced “a slight increase in alpha [waves] over that of the 60 percent cacao only [group].”

    He states that theoretically, a mixture containing L-theanine and 90 to 100 percent cacao should further increase the desired brain waves to produce a more powerful attentive and calm state. He’s looking forward to conducting future studies involving higher-content cacao and L-theanine.

    Thus, consuming a mixture of L-theanine and 60 or more percent cacao can aid in meditation by facilitating your transition into a calm but alert state.

    However, Professor Stevens also hopes that a high-content cacao chocolate bar containing L-theanine will become a mainstream healthy alternative to coffee due to its attention-increasing and blood pressure lowering properties. He states, “A lot of us in the afternoon get a little fuzzy… so we could have a higher cacao content chocolate bar and it would increase attention.”

    When you give your love chocolates this Valentine’s Day you’re protecting their hearts and waistlines, while enriching their mind. Conversely, if you’re receiving chocolates their health benefits should keep you from feeling guilty about enjoying them. It’s even better if you’re making your own gift chocolates because you can add L-theanine to them to add more blood pressure-lowering and mental therapeutic effects.