Is that right? Yes, in moderation, beer and wine may be good for your bones.

The findings of the study were reported in April issue of American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.  It seems that older men and postmenopausal women who have one or two glasses of beer or wine a day have stronger bones than both nondrinkers and heavy drinkers.

It has been suggested that wine drinkers are associated with lower risk of heart disease, but it also has been suggested that alcohol increases the risk for some cancers. Even though their study found that beer and wine could be beneficial to bone strength, the researchers cautioned that people need to balance the risks and benefits of alcohol with their individual health concerns.

The participants of this study, Framingham Osteoporosis Study, extracted from the Framingham Offspring cohort (original population based Framingham Heart Study). The report was based on the data collected from 1,289 postmenopausal women, 248 premenopausal women and 1,182 men. The participants’ ages were from 29 to 86 years. They completed the food-frequency questionnaires and their alcohol intake. The bone mineral density (BMD) measurements were taken in their right hips and lumbar spine.

The mean BMI was 27-29 (overweight) for all groups. Among men, beer was the main alcoholic drink, as for women, wine was the most commonly consumed.

The hip BMD was greater (3.4 – 4.5%) in men consuming 1-2 drinks a day than the nondrinkers. Although moderate (1-2 drinks) improved BMD, men who had more than two drinks a day had hip and spine BMD measurements lower (3.0 – 5.2%) than in men who drank less. Moreover, postmenopausal women consuming more than 2 drinks a day had the hip and spine BMD measurement higher (5.0 – 8.3%) than the nondrinkers.

The lead author of the study, Katherine L. Tucker, director of the Dietary Assessment and Epidemiology Research Program at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University in Boston, said “we were looking at the relationship between different types of alcohol and BMD because there is a controversy about how it might affect bone. Alcohol was protective of BMD in older men and postmenopausal women, but we didn’t see any relationship in premenopausal women.”"

The authors suggest that the relationship is complex but there might be components in beer and wine that could help protect bones.  Silicon is a major component of  beer that may promote bone formation. Furthermore, it has been reported previously that higher dietary intake of silicon is associated with higher BMD. The major constituent of wine that has been receiving considerable attention, in particularly to heart disease is resveratrol.   Reverastrol demonstrated to increase BMD in rats. Therefore, reverastrol may be associated to not only protect your heart but your bones as well.

The paper concluded the following: moderate consumption (1-2 drinks) of beer or wine is good for bone. On the other hand,  high liquor consumption (more than 2 drink a day) in men was associated with lower BMD. The relative association of BMD with beer and wine and not so much with liquor suggest that other than alcohol contributes to the bone health.

It has been reported not long ago that moderate drinking can increase the risk of cancer in postmenopausal women (February 2009, online edition of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute). The study found that moderate drinking accounts for 13 percent of breast, liver, rectum and upper respiratory/digestive tract cancers.

Everyone has their own identity; you have to think about your own risks and you family history and try to balance all together. If you have a history of breast cancer in your family then you should be careful with alcohol. On the other hand, if you are concern about heart disease and osteoporosis, then 1 or 2 glasses of wine will probably be beneficial. At the end, moderation is the key word. You need to balance it all, good nutrition with a variety of food, and moderation. Nothing should be taken in excess, because too much of anything is bad.

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Increase your vitamin C consumption and you could prevent not only cold but gout as well.

According to a new study published recently at Archives of Internal Medicine, researchers found that men who had the highest intake of vitamin C (or ascorbic acid which is an essential nutrient for human) from supplements and/or food were up to 45% less likely to develop gout.

This was a prospective study, meaning that the participants were not assigned to include vitamin C or not include vitamin C in their diet during the study.  The analysis was done in 46,994 male participants with no history of gout at the time of recruitment.  The vitamin C intake was assessed every 4 years using a supplementary questionnaire to determine the American College of Rheumatology criteria for gout from 1986 to 2006.

During the 20 years of follow-up, the authors documented 1317 incidents of gout. Interestingly, men that had higher vitamin C intake had a lower risk of developing gout.  Accordingly to the authors’ calculation, from every 500 mg increase in vitamin C intake, the risk for developing gout decreases approximately 17%. In other words, the comparison was done with men whose vitamin C intake was less than 250 mg per day, the risk for gout was: 45% lower with a daily intake of 1,500 mg or more, 34% lower with a daily intake of 1,000 to 1,499 mg and 17% lower with a daily intake of 500 to 999 mg.

Increased levels of uric acid lead to formation of crystals, which can be deposited in the joints causing pain, inflammation and swelling associated with gout. The authors of the paper suggest that vitamin C may reduce the levels of uric acid in blood by increasing uric acid excretion. Others studies have been recently published indicating that supplement of vitamin C increases the glomerular filtration rate (the rate that blood is filtrated in order to separate the useful compounds and waste material by forming urine, normally 125 ml per minute) which could be another mechanism by which vitamin C increase the excretion of uric acid. Since vitamin C is well know for its antioxidant properties, it is still to be determined if this anti-inflammatory property contributes for the prevention of gout.

The authors, at the end of the paper,  concluded the following:  “given the general safety profile associated with vitamin C intake, particularly in the generally consumed ranges as in the present study (eg, tolerable upper intake level of vitamin C <2000 mg in adults according to the Food and Nutrition Board, Institute of Medicine) vitamin C intake may provide a useful option in the prevention of gout.”

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Should I go on low fat diet? How about low carb? And high protein? There is no bad or good diet…the solution is simple: eat less!

A study published on the New England Journal of Medicine compared  4 diet plans which included a variety of combination of fat, protein and carbohydrates and found that no matter which diet you select, you will lose weight if you consume less calories.

In this study called POUNDS LOST, Dr. Frank Sacks and his colleagues recruited 811 overweight or obese people (BMI of 25 or higher), aged 30 to 70 years, various ethnicities and 38 percent male.  At the time of recruitment, participants did not have diabetes or severe heart disease, but could have other risks such as high blood pressure or high cholesterol.  The participants were randomly assigned to one of the 4 diets:

Counseling sessions were held at least twice a month for 2 years throughout the study.  Calories goal (raging from 1,200 to 2,400) were given individually to each participant depending on his or hers daily energy requirement.  All of the participants were asked to do some sort of physical activity for at least 90 minutes per week.  All the participants were also asked to enter their daily food intake and exercise information either using a diary format or into a computer program.  Around 80 percent of the participants completed the study.

Interestingly, after six months in the study, the average weight loss in all participants was about 13 pounds in all 4 diets. After two years, the average lost was down to 6-7 pounds.  Moreover, all the diets improved the risk factors for cardiovascular disease such as decreased in triglycerides levels, LDL cholesterol (bad cholesterol), lowered blood pressure and increased HDL cholesterol (good cholesterol).  Furthermore, all the diets decreased the presence of metabolic syndrome, which is a cluster of conditions that increases heart disease risk.

“On average, no one diet was better than another, eat a heart-healthy diet and be very careful about how much you eat” said Dr. Sacks.  In other words, it is not what you eat, but how much you eat.

It is a very simple equation:  your body is a balance of energy.  If you burn more calories (through exercise, activities) than your body consumes daily (through food or drink), you will lose weight. It all comes down to calories count… eat less calories than you use.

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Is the economic melt down affecting your emotional health? Look for the signs of stress and how they affect your physical health and learn how to protect your well-being.

With the present unstable economy, daily reports of recession and depression, the stock market as a roller coaster, housing placed foreclosure and short-sale, loss of employment, loss of retirement savings, Americans are experiencing excessive stress, anxiety and even trauma.  We are all aware of the stress that this economy is causing, but are we aware of the impact that is causing to our health?

The number of Americans that lost their jobs, their houses, their investments are astronomical.  Even the ones that still have their jobs, still have their houses, still have their finances covered, are going through stress, not knowing what they will be facing in the near future.

According to the American Psychological Association (APA), the top causes of stress in America is money (81%), economy (80%), work (67%), and health problems affecting family (67%).

It is well known that when stress becomes chronic (long-term) your body will respond to it.  It has been reported lately that physicians are seeing more patients with stress-induced illness.  The mental health centers are receiving more calls than ever.  Even children are suffering, according to therapists.

In order to better cope with the economic stress, reach out to family, friend and professional help, if necessary.  Many studies demonstrated that receiving support from others is very effective in managing stress.

Stress can cause health problems or make problems that you already have worse. You have to learn to deal with it.

What are the possible signs of stress?

And people with stress usually feel:

Do you recognize any of the signs above?  So, what can you do to manage your stress?  First, can you change the event or thing that is creating your stress?  Most of the time, this is not possible.  A second way is to change how you react to stress, and this is the best way to deal with your stress.

In order to manage the stress you should:

Invest in your emotional health

Don’t ignore your emotional health.  Like your physical health,  emotional healthy requires time and energy to maintain.  By preserving your emotional health you will have a healthier recovery back from stress.

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Is there such a thing as a good addiction? You just found one: coffee

If you enjoy your coffee and feel some kind of remorse, here is the reason to not feel the guilt. According to a new study published in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association, drinking coffee reduces the risk of stroke in women. This study reported that women who drank 4 or more cups of coffee a day had a 20% reduced risk of stroke when compared to women who had less than 1 cup per month. Moreover, drinking 2 to 3 cups per day reduced the risk by 19% and drinking a cup 5 to 7 times a week reduced the risk by 12%.

This was an observational study, meaning that the participants were not assigned to drink coffee or not to drink coffee. The analysis was done using data on 83,076 women who participated in the Nurse’s Health Study, which recruited women with no history of stroke, heart disease, diabetes or cancer. The coffee intake was first assessed in 1980 and repeated the assessment every 2 to 4 years with follow-up until 2004, by filling out a food frequency questionnaires about their diet. Throughout these 24 years, the authors documented 2,280 strokes.

Women who never smoked and drank 4 cups or more a day was associated with a 43% reduction in stroke risk, while women who smoked and drank 4 cups or more a day was associated with only 3% reduction in stroke risk, suggesting that the benefit of coffee in nonsmokers is more significant than smokers. Interestingly, decaffeinated coffee consumption also reduces the risk of stroke in women, indicating that the reduction of stroke risk is not due to caffeine. To further confirm, women who drank tea and caffeinated soft drink did not experience the reduction in stroke risk, suggesting that other components in coffee are responsible for this beneficial effect.

The authors of the report concluded that “long-term coffee consumption was not associated with an increased risk of stroke in women. In contrast, the data suggest that coffee consumption may modestly reduce risk of stroke”. The biological mechanism still unknown, therefore further investigation is needed prior to be considered a clinical practice.

If you’re looking to lower your risk of stroke, you may utilize standard practice such as: discontinue smoke, maintain a healthy weight by implementing daily physical activity, control high blood pressure (lowering your dietary salt intake, medication), control high cholesterol (lowering fat intake), control diabetes (maintain healthy weight by lowering your dietary fat intake,  increase physical activity and lowering your alcohol intake).

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Cheers!

Juliana