Tag Archives: life extension

The Medicine Cabinet in Your Spice Rack

By Steven V. Joyal, MD, VP of Medical & Scientific Affairs at Life Extension.

Spices add delicious flavors and tantalizing aromas to food, but many people don’t realize that spices offer a variety of beneficial, potentially lifesaving, health benefits. Consider your spice rack as a kind of natural medicine cabinet, and unleash amazing health benefits while you spice up your life with the following five spices!

Cinnamon: Derived from the bark of the tree bearing the same name, cinnamon is high in antioxidant activity. Clinical studies show beneficial changes in blood sugar control in patients with type 2 diabetes dosed with cinnamon spice from one to three grams daily. Experimental research suggests that cinnamon may reduce the likelihood that cells in the colon undergo cancerous changes. Essential oils of cinnamon have antimicrobial activity, too, and this helps provide a scientific basis for cinnamon’s traditional use as a natural treatment for diarrhea.

(more…)

Posted on August 11, 2024 by GuestBlogger

Are Environmental Toxins Causing Your Weight Gain?

By Steven V. Joyal, MD, VP of Medical & Scientific Affairs at Life Extension.

The simplistic “eat less, move around more” solution for weight loss cannot explain the sharp increase in the rise of obesity over the past 30 years. The disturbing fact is that toxins in our environment are hidden causes of weight gain.

Our children represent the future. Yet their future may be irrevocably mortgaged by toxic chemicals that seep into our food supply, lying in wait to trigger damaging effects. The startling truth is that infant obesity rates have skyrocketed 73% over the past 30 years (since 1980), and an important, yet under-recognized culprit, is the presence of special types of environmental toxins in our food supply.

Certain hormone-mimicking chemical toxins in our foods act on genes during development that literally create more fat cells. These toxic endocrine disruptor chemicals change our metabolism to hoard calories as body fat. Endocrine disruptors are chemicals that mimic the effects of certain types of hormones in your body to promote weight gain.

(more…)

Posted on July 23, 2024 by GuestBlogger

Food Sensitivity: The Surprising Reason You’re Gaining Weight

By Steven V. Joyal, MD, VP of Medical & Scientific Affairs at Life Extension. Life Extension has been a pioneer in funding and reporting the latest anti-aging research and integrative health therapies while offering superior-quality dietary supplements to consumers.

Feeling bloated? Gaining weight but don’t know why? Food sensitivity might be the cause. Chronic, low-level inflammation due to food sensitivity is a little-appreciated contributing factor for unwanted weight gain, along with other health conditions like fatigue, fluid retention, headache, and skin conditions.

Before we review how sensitivity to certain foods can make weight loss difficult, we need to understand the difference between food sensitivity and food allergy.

Classic food allergy occurs when certain foods trigger the immune system to release large amounts of the chemical histamine. When large amounts of histamine flood the body, a potentially life-threatening condition called anaphylaxis can occur. This potentially fatal condition causes the throat to swell, potentially cutting off the air supply to the lungs.

(more…)

Posted on June 26, 2024 by GuestBlogger