bright colors, long life
Eat your veggies and you may live longer, a newly released study suggests. A just heard about a new long-term study, on average they followed those in the study for 14 years, suggests that high dietary intake of alpha-carotene may help prevent death risk from all causes, heart disease or cardiovascular disease, cancer, and all other causes. That’s right, not just cancer or not just heart disease, all death risks. Researchers found that people with the highest levels of the antioxidant alpha-carotene in their blood had a 39% lower risk of death from any cause, including heart disease and cancer, than those who had the lowest levels of the antioxidant during the 14-year study.
This plant-derived nutrient may serve as a biomarker even though it is also possible that carotene may indeed play a role in the preventative effect on death risk. You can find it in your bright orange/red vegetables and fruits (like pumpkin on Thanksgiving) and bright greens of course. The brighter the rainbow the better the quality of the alpha-carotene. Technically alpha-carotene is part of a group of antioxidants known as carotenoids, which also includes beta-carotene and lycopene. Vegetables particularly high in alpha-carotene include yellow-orange vegetables, such as carrots, sweet potatoes, pumpkin, and winter squash, and dark green vegetables, such as broccoli, green beans, green peas, spinach, turnip greens, collards, and lettuce. We’ve known for a long time about the good things we get from beta-carotene and lycopene for some time. I’m sure all of you have heard Dr. Oz talk about both of these often over the years. Early studies have associated beta-carotene and total carotinoids with risk of cardiovascular disease and cancer, according to the background information in the study report.
During this study, Chaoyang Li, MD and Ph.D.and colleagues from The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and University of California at Los Angeles followed 15,318 US adults aged 20 or older who participated in the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey Follow-up Study and tried to establish an association between serum alpha-carotene levels and death risk from cancer and cardiovascular disease. Chaoyang Li says, “These findings support increasing fruit and vegetable consumption as a means of preventing premature death.” They say alpha-carotene is chemically similar to beta-carotene but may be more effective at protecting cells in the brain, liver and skin.
So make your Thanksgiving table brighter this year, and try to make every day a bit of a rainbow to make sure you life a long healthy life.
November 23, 2010 No Comments
bright colors, long life
Eat your veggies and you may live longer, a newly released study suggests. A just heard about a new long-term study, on average they followed those in the study for 14 years, suggests that high dietary intake of alpha-carotene may help prevent death risk from all causes, heart disease or cardiovascular disease, cancer, and all other causes. That’s right, not just cancer or not just heart disease, all death risks. Researchers found that people with the highest levels of the antioxidant alpha-carotene in their blood had a 39% lower risk of death from any cause, including heart disease and cancer, than those who had the lowest levels of the antioxidant during the 14-year study.
This plant-derived nutrient may serve as a biomarker even though it is also possible that carotene may indeed play a role in the preventative effect on death risk. You can find it in your bright orange/red vegetables and fruits (like pumpkin on Thanksgiving) and bright greens of course. The brighter the rainbow the better the quality of the alpha-carotene. Technically alpha-carotene is part of a group of antioxidants known as carotenoids, which also includes beta-carotene and lycopene. Vegetables particularly high in alpha-carotene include yellow-orange vegetables, such as carrots, sweet potatoes, pumpkin, and winter squash, and dark green vegetables, such as broccoli, green beans, green peas, spinach, turnip greens, collards, and lettuce. We’ve known for a long time about the good things we get from beta-carotene and lycopene for some time. I’m sure all of you have heard Dr. Oz talk about both of these often over the years. Early studies have associated beta-carotene and total carotinoids with risk of cardiovascular disease and cancer, according to the background information in the study report.
During this study, Chaoyang Li, MD and Ph.D.and colleagues from The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and University of California at Los Angeles followed 15,318 US adults aged 20 or older who participated in the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey Follow-up Study and tried to establish an association between serum alpha-carotene levels and death risk from cancer and cardiovascular disease. Chaoyang Li says, “These findings support increasing fruit and vegetable consumption as a means of preventing premature death.” They say alpha-carotene is chemically similar to beta-carotene but may be more effective at protecting cells in the brain, liver and skin.
So make your Thanksgiving table brighter this year, and try to make every day a bit of a rainbow to make sure you life a long healthy life.
November 23, 2010 No Comments
