New Natural Help for Urinary Problems

Whether you are a man or a woman, if you are having difficulty urinating or making seemingly endless visits to the bathroom every night then you know all about the inconvenience and embarrassment associated with this condition. Whether the problems are the result of incontinence, or frequent urination due to an enlarged prostate you might want to consider a new supplement called Pumpkin Seed Extract.

Research confirms that pumpkin seeds promote healthy urine flow, help reduce the frequency of toilet visits, strengthens weak bladder muscles that usually lead to incontinence, and, when used long-term, aid those suffering from Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia.

The use of pumpkin seeds as a natural diuretic aid is not new, but for something so small they are packed with beneficial elements. They contains high levels of amino acids, beta carotene, vitamin E, magnesium, calcium, zinc, potassium, copper, and manganese and are also rich in Omega 3 and 6 essential fatty acids, and phytosterols.

The key to their usefulness for urinary problems though is the fact that pumpkin seeds also contain curbicin, a substance structurally similar to testosterone, and oestrogen, which research shows helps strengthen bladder muscles, promote healthy urine flow, and reduce nocturia, regular night-time urination.

If you want to try it then this new supplement comes from Lifeplan and contains 30mg of pumpkin seed extract, equivalent to 300mg of fresh pumpkin seeds, and the recommended dose is to take one tablet twice daily, to either help maintain a healthy urinary system or to help rectify an existing urinary problem.

You should be able to find it in your local health store but if n do not go online to www.lifeplan.co.uk or call 01455 556281 for your nearest stockist.

9 Naturopathic Tips To Raising Energy Levels

Men’s Health Week is focused around physical activity and so Harley Street’s world leading naturopathic physician Harald Gaier is offering his tips on improving energy to raise awareness of the importance of looking after your health.

Following research by Men’s Health Forum, stating that men over the age of 35 tend to reduce the amount of physical activity they undertake, blaming pressure of work, stress, the divorce and children as the causes, Dr Gaier has some suggestions for how to help men to stay healthy. I have said it so often it must be imprinted on your brain cells by now, but physical activity has been shown to reduce stress and anxiety as well as decreasing the risk of cancer, heart disease and diabetes and can even improve sexual performance. I thought that last bit might wake you up!

Dr Gaier commented: “For practitioners of Herbal Medicine, preventing disease is not an afterthought: it is the cornerstone of such a healthcare practice. Natural Medicine practitioners are trained to be agents of life-style change. They treat illness promptly and aggressively when appropriate, but always seek to maximise the body’s innate capacity to stay healthy and resist disease and injury.”

So, bearing that in mind, here’s how to make a difference to your energy levels:

1 Water
Another old favourite that I can’t over-emphasise the importance as when your calls become dehydrated it saps your energy. Even slight dehydration of 1 or 2 % of your body weight can make you feel tired. Don’t wait until you are thirsty because if you feel thirsty, you’re already dehydrated and this can lead to fatigue, muscle weakness, dizziness and other symptoms

2 Exercise
Yes I know you’ve heard it all before, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. Exercise gets your heart pumping and increases your metabolism, but more importantly it releases endorphins which gives you that same happy sensation you get when you have sex or eat chocolate, for this reason your brain begins to crave it more. A great form of exercise for men is Yoga — and no it is not just for women in pink leotards, but has been a staple of a strong healthy body for men at all ages in India and increasingly in the West. A 10-15 minute yoga session in the morning will speed up your metabolism and has the potential to work out every muscle in your body – which your regular cup of coffee just can’t match.

3 Keep the weight off
Obesity can be the cause for a lack of energy, as this excess weight can slow you down and leave you feeling drained, tired and not to mention lowering your sexual self esteem.

4 Graze not guzzle
It’s important to maintain a normal blood sugar level and in order to do this you should eat every few hours. This will help you maintain muscle tissue, which burns more calories than fat tissue, and will help increase your energy levels.

5 Don’t neglect carbohydrates
With all the emphasis on high protein and low fat diets carbohydrates have been rather neglected, but they are an essential part of your daily diet. They provide us with the much-needed energy to power us through the day as they release energy slowly into your body to keep you going for longer.

6 Sleep: Although we all have different sleep requirements, there is an absolute minimum that the body needs for essential maintenance and rejuvenation during your rest period. The ideal if you can manage it is 8 hours a night but the average in the UK is only around 5-6 hours which means that your body isn’t fully alert which which has an impact on your stamina levels, and not for the better.

7 Avoid quick fixes
It is so tempting when you’re tired to reach for a cup of coffee or a sticky bun or her a piece of chocolate and psychologically this may well give you a boost however the physical reality is somewhat different. Your body will waste copious amounts of energy turning the sugar in the snack into energy to use in your body and the boost will be short lived, and inevitably leaving you more drained as it imbalances your blood sugar. The best things to keep in your snack drawer — what do you mean you don’t have one — I’m nuts, fruit or whole grain products.

8 Detox
The less your diet is 100% pure, organic and natural the reality is that you will be taking in toxins that stress and pollute our bodies. Toxins can have many effects that the most common are to make us feel lethargic and bloated at best and ill and depressed at worst. It’s a great idea to have a regular detox day at least once a week as the actor Larry Hagman used to do when he only ate fruit on Sundays. There are certainly plenty of detox diets available but you can just make it simple and spent one day having nothing but water, Herb tea, and fruit such as grapes, cranberries and pomegranates a as they are all effective at ridding the body of toxins.

9 Laugh
How do you feel after you’ve had a good belly laugh? That’s right, you feel good you feel energised and you feel lighter and that’s because it generates chemicals in the blood that boost well-being. Try to laugh at least five times a day — you can do if you try.

If Dr Gaier’s ideas appeal to you on how to improve your health then you can find out more at his website at www.drgaier.com or for the technically adept amongst you is also on twitter at www.twitter.com/drgaier

Natural Help For Arthritis from Rosehips

I am showing my age here, but as a child at school we used to collect rose hips every autumn and were paid a vast sum – a penny a pound I think – to hand them in. Child labour laws no doubt prevent that now, but with their very high level of antioxidants and vitamin C they have a range of uses – and a new one is in treating arthritis.

With 1 in 4 adults being diagnosed with either osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis, and it accounting for 1 in 5 GP consultations, it is obviously a serious problem with up to 9 million people being affected in some way. Trials have confirmed the effectiveness of rosehips to help with the side effects of arthritis such as inflammation, reduced movement, and associated pain. Research supports the benefit of taking a rosehip supplement whether you suffer from the general wear-and-tear, or the potentially more crippling rheumatoid arthritis, which occurs when the immune system attacks the joints.

Three short-term clinical trials confirmed the benefits of rosehips as an effective pain reliever in those suffering from osteoarthritis and additional research in Denmark and Germany established that those with rheumatoid arthritis showed a marked reduction in the number of joints experiencing pain or discomfort.

We don’t know exactly why rosehips benefit those with arthritis but rosehips in general are known to help maintain a healthy heart, and to lower cholesterol levels. We do know that because rosehips are an ultra-rich source of anti-inflammatory glycosides, which along with the antioxidant properties they have seem to beneficial to those experiencing joint problems, such as arthritis.

If you want to give it a try, and I am certainly doing so, then there is a new Rosehip Extract supplement from Lifeplan that provides 100mg of rosehip extract, equivalent to 2000mg of dried rosehip fruit. These high strength capsules are approved by the Vegan Society and should be in your local health store, if not visit the website at www.lifeplan.co.uk and don’t forget the other two key arthritis elements: a good diet and regular exercise. An excellent book for arthritis sufferers is ‘Say No To Arthritis’ by Patrick Holford which will give you plenty of tips and ideas on coping – and alleviating – the condition.

Are You An ADD Adult?

I have to confess an interest in this subject as I certainly am subject to Attention deficit disorder (ADD) but in my case without the hyperactivity. ADD or ADHD doesn’t just affect children, though they certainly seem to be increasingly prone to it, but roughly 4 % of adults certainly have some of the symptoms. So far no one knows what causes it, or makes someone more vulnerable to it, though there is increasing evidence that it might have a biological basis, but whatever the cause it helps to know how to deal with it.

With the pressure we are all under, and as we get older, we are subject to lapses of memory, distraction and sheer overload. The official diagnosis of ADHD includes the three major symptoms of inattentiveness, hyperactivity and impulsiveness and you can have any or all of these symptoms. When trying to learn, complete a project or get on with people these traits can get in the way – however on the positive side ADHD often goes alongside creativity and thinking outside the box.

If you are not sure whether you are in this category there is a simple, quick test at the appallingly named Psych Central, but don’t let that put you off. The website is psychcentral.com/addquiz.htm and I have to confess that out of 100 I got 92. If I was competitive I would say ‘beat that!’ but not sure that is going to help – why do you think I wrote a book on procrastination!

Natural Help:

If your ADHD seriously impacts your life then you may need professional help, but there are some simple steps to take first to give you some support.

1 You need to keep your brain healthy and functioning well and to do that it needs a good supply of the Omega-3 fatty acids. You can get these through your diet from oily fish, whole foods, flaxseeds and walnuts.

2 A high protein, low carbohydrate works for most ADHD sufferers, except for those whose problem is being over focused, they need carbohydrates far more than protein.

3 Your brain needs dopamine to stay focused and able to concentrate and the best way to do it is through regular exercise. Anything you like as long as you enjoy it enough to maintain it.

4 Back to the previous item, and yet another benefit of mindfulness meditation is that it has been shown to ‘centre’ and stabilise that chattering mind that often goes with ADHD.

In the US there is much talk about the Feingold diet which is claimed to help not just ADHD but many other disorders as well and if you want to check it out go to http://www.feingold.org/ but there are some simple rules you can implement straight away – but remember no diet or regime suits everyone so experiment and see if it works for you:.

ADHD sufferers do best when their sugar levels are even so cut out sugar in all forms as that will make your insulin levels rise and fall, causing mood changes and irritability. If you do have lots of sugar you are likely to crash, become spacey, confused and unable to pay attention. Eating little and often works best, and don’t eat three hours before bed. Try to have protein with most meals and limit fruit juices because of their high sugar content so eat fruit instead.

WARNING: If you are on any ADHD medicine then give up caffeine, tobacco, and alcohol as they dehydrate the body and affect your mood. Alcohol mixed with ADHD medications can be life threatening and both caffeine and tobacco decrease the blood flow to the brain and makes the condition worse. Citric acid can interfere with some ADHD medications so limit your intake of oranges, tangerines and grapefruit as well as their juices.

Pain Reduced by Meditation

I am a great advocate of meditation for many things: stress management, pain relief from arthritis, relaxation and general sense of increased peace and happiness. Now it seems that people who meditate regularly find pain less unpleasant because their brains anticipate the pain less – no one so far has yet done a study on meditation relating to childbirth pain, but I would be interested to hear from any readers experience of it. Currently In the UK 40% of people who suffer from chronic pain report inadequate management of their pain problem so any relief is welcomed.

You do need to keep practicing to get this pain relief benefit though as scientists from the University of Manchester found that only the more advanced meditators had a different anticipation and experience of pain when compared to non-meditators.

It didn’t seem to matter what kind of meditation as long it included ‘mindfulness meditation’ practices, such as those that form the basis of Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), recommended for recurrent depression by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) in 2004.

Dr Christopher Brown, who conducted the research, said that “meditation is becoming increasingly popular as a way to treat chronic illness such as the pain caused by arthritis and recently, a mental health charity called for meditation to be routinely available on the NHS to treat depression, which occurs in up to 50% of people with chronic pain. However, scientists have only just started to look into how meditation might reduce the emotional impact of pain.”

The study found that particular areas of the brain were less active as meditators anticipated pain and that people who meditate also showed unusual activity during anticipation of pain in part of the prefrontal cortex. This is the region of the brain known to be involved in controlling attention and thought processes when potential threats are perceived. . Meditation trains the brain to be more present-focused and therefore to spend less time anticipating future negative events. This may be why meditation is effective at reducing the recurrence of depression, which makes chronic pain considerably worse.

Study co-author Professor Anthony Jones said: “One might argue that if a therapy works, then why should we care how it works? But it may be surprising to learn that the mechanisms of action of many current therapies are largely unknown, a fact that hinders the development of new treatments. Understanding how meditation works would help improve this method of treatment and help in the development of new therapies.

If I was feeling cynical I might say that scientists have always been distinctly wary of anything ‘emotional’ that can’t be proved, so I do celebrate this as a giant step forward. If you want to conduct your own ‘research’ there are many classes available on meditation and plenty of self-help CD’s if you can’t get to a class. If you want to have a look at the meditation CD I produced to help you relax and reduce stress then please visit this link and scroll down the page http://www.catalystonline.co.uk/health.htm

Forget yoghurt for probiotics – choose cheese instead

We know we need to have healthy flora in our intestine to keep our immune system working at its best and for optimum health. The modern solution is to take either a probiotic supplement or one of the many yoghurt or milk-based products you will find in the supermarket that have been enhanced with beneficial flora. These have their place, but food is known to have a buffering effect as both probiotic and lactic acid bacteria travel through the gastric juices in the stomach so real food gives a much higher survivability rate than supplements. Now however there is a new, natural and very tasty solution to getting the right amount of beneficial flora — particularly as we get older.

Scientists in Finland have discovered that aged cheese can help preserve and enhance the immune system of the elderly by acting as a carrier for probiotic bacteria. All you need to do is eat a daily helping of a probiotic cheese to help tackle the normal, age-related, changes in the immune system.

Dr Fandi Ibrahim from the University of Turku in Finland describes this age-related deterioration of the immune system as immunosenescene which means that the body is unable to kill tumour cells and reduces the immune response to vaccinations and infections.

Immunosenescene is also indicative of infectious diseases, chronic inflammation disorders and cancer and Dr Ibrahim’s team targeted the gastrointestinal tract, which is the main entry for bacteria cells into the body through food and drink and is also the site where 70% of vital immunoglobulin cells are created.

The volunteers all lived in the same care home and were aged between 72 and 103, which must say a lot for the standard of Finland’s care homes! All the participants were asked to eat one slice of either placebo or probiotic Gouda cheese with their breakfast for four weeks – which is not an uncommon breakfast food in that part of the world – and blood tests where then carried out.

They wanted to discover the effect of probiotic bacteria contained within the cheese on the immune system and the results revealed a clear enhancement of natural and acquired immunity. Or in other words, a much improved immune system and if you were wondering what makes a probiotic cheese it is simply one that is aged and made from raw milk or buy a fermentation process.

The longer cheese is aged for, the more probiotics and metabiotics (beneficial byproducts released as the probiotics digest their food) it will contain These cheeses will contain more of the lactic acid producing bacteria that the human body is designed to eat, but that doesn’t include mozzarella and ricotta as they do not normally contain probiotics due to being made by different methods or anything labelled “cheese spread” or “cheese product”. These have been heated to a temperature that kills the good bacteria so that all the good qualities of cheese are destroyed but the fat remains!

So stock up your cheese board with Cheddar, Emmental, naturally aged Gouda and any of the Swedish and Norwegian hard cheeses that you can find in your supermarket chiller cabinet. The tasty solution, and a healthy one, to keep your immune system strong and healthy.

Don’t Fight Dandruff With Chemicals

No one likes to have dandruff, and there are plenty of shampoos and products on the market to help with unsightly white cloud. It’s tempting to just reach for the nearest bottle of antidandruff shampoo, but if you take a few moments to read the ingredients you might want to think again as they often contain harmful chemical substances such as coal tar that can have damaging effects on your health as it particularly it has been linked with kidney or liver problems. There are some much simpler, pleasanter and more natural methods of dealing with dandruff by using herbs, essential oils, vitamins and minerals.

You certainly know when you have dandruff, as the visible signs are obvious to you and everyone else. Do you know why you get it? It happens when the fine cells of the outer layer of skin on the scalp are shed at a faster rate than normal, causing flakes to fall and this is caused by a disorder of the sebaceous glands. If too little sebum is secreted, the hair is dry and dandruff appears as white flakes; if too much sebum is produced, the hair is greasy and the dandruff is a waxy yellow. If your scalp is inflamed and itchy then it’s likely you have seborrheic dermatitis, a severe form of dandruff, and eczema, allergies to hair products and psoriasis may also cause it. Also, if you have a shortage of the minerals zinc and selenium, and vitamin E, vitamin C and vitamin B complex in your diet than that can also contribute to your getting dandruff.

To tackle it yourself, an old herbal remedy is to rub rosemary-infused oil into the scalp before washing. Rinse greasy hair with rosemary vinegar or add a few drops of rosemary essential oil into rinsing water. Herbs that improve the condition of the scalp include burdock, kelp and heartsease.

Aromatherapy solutions for dandruff are cedarwood, tea tree or patchouli – all of which can be massaged into the scalp by blending a few drops of your chosen essential oil with a carrier oil, such as jojoba. You can also massage the scalp with a few drops of lavender oil and almond oil to eliminate dandruff.

Another tried and trusted remedy is to use tissue salts and these usually needs to be taken over a fairly long period of time. Tissue Salt No. 5 is Kali. Mur. And this is the one to take if you have white, flaky dandruff but be aware that sometimes the dandruff may get worse at the beginning. You can also add Kali. Mur. to your diet by increasing foods such as green beans, carrots, beetroot, fresh corn, kale, asparagus, pineapples, lemons and plums.

One of the most useful tissue salts for sticky, waxy dandruff; with flaky, dry patches on the scalp as well as alopecia (hair loss) is Tissue Salt No. 6 – Kali. Sulph. Increase the amount of parsley, linseed, mustard, watercress, and the herb lemon balm.

One of the most useful salts is No. 12 – Silica for both treating dandruff, improving the condition of dull and lacklustre and keeping the scalp healthy. Herbs and foods rich in silica are stinging nettle, dandelion, comfrey, wheat, maize, barley, oats, apples, guavas, spinach, chicory and celery.

Diabetes Help from the Baby Jackfruit

The figures for diabetes in the UK are worrying, and increasing. There are currently 2.3 million people diagnosed with diabetes and more than 500,000 believed to have the condition but aren’t aware of it. Within 15 year, at the current rate of increase, it is thought that there will be an additional 1.3 million people with the condition which is the equivalent of a 46% increase.

Like many conditions, diabetes can be helped by a dressing diet and lifestyle. One new element on the horizon is the Baby Jackfruit – an unusual and interesting red skinned fruit from Asia which has been seen to have potential health benefits for diabetes sufferers.

Baby Jackfruit, is known as the ‘fruit from heaven’, and is used for food and medicinal purposes across Southeast Asia. It is hardly ever seen in Europe because it fruits only once a year and so is found mainly in local markets at the right time of year.

Recent studies have shown that Baby Jackfruit has been found to be very high in a molecule called beta-carotene, which is a vegetable form of Vitamin A and it is thought that many diabetics suffer from a lack of this nutrient due to poor diets. There are a number of studies that indicate vitamin A may be beneficial for those suffering with diabetes and a clinical trial on 52 healthy volunteers showed that there is a distinct relationship between the amount of Vitamin A you have in your body and the speed at which the body can dispose of glucose. This could potentially be valuable for type 2 diabetes sufferers as it is the inability to break down glucose, and hence its high levels in the blood, that can cause health problems.

Jackfruit contains by far the highest content of beta-carotene of any known fruit or vegetable, 10 times higher than carrots for example and research has confirmed that the beta-carotene (Vitamin A) it contains is highly bioavailable to humans. In a double-blind study, based on 185 subjects, people were either given 3.5mg of beta-carotene from Baby Jackfruit, or an identical looking preparation of 5mgof beta-carotene powder. After 30 days, the former group, eating natural beta-carotene from the Baby Jackfruit, had significantly greater plasma (blood) levels of beta-carotene than the latter, who used synthetic beta-carotene.

Another benefit of eating vegetables rich in carotenoids, such as beta-carotene found in Baby Jackfruit, is that they are thought to help protect against raised blood glucose levels and may well be a preventative factor in hyperglycemia. This benefit of the metabolism of glucose from eating carotenoids from fruit and vegetables has also been shown in men at high risk of type 2 diabetes, and so may well help in the disease developing in the first place.

You may well struggle to find it in your local supermarket, though if you have a good Asian market you may be lucky enough to find it there. If you are interested in trying it, then a supplement is probably going to be your best bet. If your local health store can’t help you, then the first one available in the UK can be obtained at www.drinkherbaltea.co.uk as capsules that contain baby jackfruit oil that is naturally extracted.

AnnA’s Solution to Breakfast

I am the world’s worst at getting organised for breakfast. What I do know is that unless I have some protein first thing in the morning I really don’t function very well, but I am also not up for cooking or spending a lot of time preparing. As I dislike most grains and certainly muesli, I have been experimenting with finding a breakfast that is fully sustaining, quick and easy to prepare.

I have settled on a combination that is part green, part fruit, part protein and certainly delicious. I have shared this recipe with others who seem to have agreed with me so I thought it would be good to share it with you in case you have one of those mornings too!

The ingredients are very variable, depending what’s on what’s in the fridge, but here is the most common combination:

Organic yoghurt — vanilla in my case

Soymilk or oat, or rice milks

Banana and/or avocado

handful of young spinach or watercress leaves

Tablespoon of protein powder from Higher Nature or a vegetarian source

Tablespoon each of Linwoods milled flaxseed and almonds and flaxseed cocoa and berries

The amount of yoghurt and milk is a matter of taste – the yoghurt makes it thicker and the milk will thin it so experiment to get your personal blend. Stick everything in a blender with a few ice cubes and blast it until it’s smooth. Adjust the liquid to your taste, and I usually add more liquid at the end. This makes enough for two, so if you are dining alone just put the rest in a sealed container in the fridge and it will be fine for 24 hours – just stir before drinking. In summer I will add strawberries or raspberries and in winter I will often use frozen berries as they give it a wonderful coldness and colour. Very healthy, delicious and sustaining. If you try it, let me know what you think.

The Benefits of Krill the Crustacean – and a Vegetarian Alternative

I almost said the thrill of the kill, but that would’ve been a pun too far! Maintaining good levels of EPA and DHA, the fatty acids which play a key role in heart and brain health and lowering the risk of depression. What the latest buzz is from across the pond, these watery metaphors have got to stop, is that a good if not the best source of these elements is to be found in a tiny crustacean in Antarctica. The krill is a mini powerhouse of nutritional benefit and when its oil is harvested it delivers a potent blend of antioxidants, omega-3 fatty acids and phospholipids.

I am always wary of the phrase ‘super food’ but this does seem to be a new way of getting the benefits of fish oil in supplement form and without the corresponding fishy smell or taste. CardioRedTM has a pure high-strength krill oil that is sourced from sustainable live krill harvests using the latest eco-friendly technology – and with 100 per cent traceability it comes from a single source, euphausia superba. –

Unlike traditional fish oils, the lipids in CardioRed Krill Oil capsules take the form of bound phospholipids, which are more easily absorbed by the body. They also contain astaxanthin, a powerful natural antioxidant. You should be able to find CardioRed Krill Oil capsules, in your local health store that if you have any difficulty go to their website at www.cardiored.co.uk.

For vegetarians, add plenty of walnuts to your diet as they are a rich plant source of omega-3s, the fatty acids also found in cold water fish like salmon and krill. Also men who are concerned about their prostate, should include walnuts as part of a balanced diet that includes lots of fruits and vegetables as they have been shown to help reduce the risk and help to treat the condition.

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