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Make sure your olive oil is fresh

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Everyone knows by now (or should know) that olive oil is one of the "healthier" cooking oils, and can lower total cholesterol as well as the unwanted LDL (low density lipoprotein) fraction in your blood.
But many people lose track of the freshness of their olive oil bottles. And as olive oil loses freshness over time, it loses some of the antioxidant properties which make it so valuable.

Health tip: make sure when you buy your olive oil that it is no older than one year, and use it before the next year is up.

Barbeque Grilled Food and Your Health

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You’ve been reading for years about the dangers lurking in grilled meats. But who doesn’t like to grill in the summer (or even the winter if the BBQ addiction is high enough).
So what do you do? How can you enjoy the simple pleasures of grilling without picturing yourself in a chemotherapy ward lamenting that last grilled steak?

The simplest solution (other than throwing the grill into the trash), is to not grill at high heats. High heats char the outside of the meat and increase the carcinogens. Cooking slower cuts down the exposure.

Additionally, cutting off the outside fat (particularly in lamb) cuts down the risk of flame-ups that burn the meat.
And it isn’t just meat. Anything with protein (fish, chicken, snake) can develop carcinogens on the grill.

Dieticians, such as Elizabeth Schaub at Baylor Medical Center point out that grilling vegetables and fruits is risk free.

Source: Baylor Health Care System

Tomatoes vs. Cancer, is the Evidence on Lycopene In?

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Sure it’s better to eat less fat, more vegetables and more tomatoes. But does the antioxidant lycopene prevent cancer?

A review published online by the Journal of the National Cancer Institute stated that their researches couldn’t find any scientifically sound evidence to support links between consuming antioxidants (food or supplements) and a statistically significant decrease in cancer of the prostate, lung, GI tract, breast or pancreas.

Source: New York Times (7/24/07)

Extra Fruits and Vegetables Don’t Necessarily Help Prevent the Recurrence of Breast Cancerdiv

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It is recommended to eat 5 servings of fruits and vegetable a day. A clinical study of women who ate twice as much as the recommended servings found that both groups had about the same in long term breast cancer survival.

The results were not what the researchers expected, as they thought the extra nutrients would improve the body’s ability to fight off recurrence of breast cancer. The extensive study was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Poor Diet May Affect Teen Asthma

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New research on asthma and diet shows that teens with poor diets may be more likely than their peers to have asthma symptoms and worse lung function.

The findings come from a study of some 2,100 teens in 12 U.S. and Canadian communities. In a nutshell, the teens with less than ideal diets were the most likely to have poorer lung function — including asthma symptoms — than their peers.

Diabetes and Diet Soft Drinks Linked

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Several studies have linked soda drinking–including diet soda– with diabetes and metabolic syndrome, a series of conditions such as obesity, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure.

According to the American Heart Association, people with metabolic syndrome are at increased risk of coronary heart disease and other diseases related to plaque buildups in artery walls.

One of the most recent studies was unique in that it included a large populations–about 6,000 individuals who were part of the Framingham Heart Study that has been following patients since 1948 in the town of Framingham, MA.

Sources:

Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA. 2004;292:927-934)
Circulation, July 24, 2007