How many people know that our body owned a very powerful recovering system? Our Mighty God created human beings and equipped us with system of adaptation and system of recovery by itself! Such amazing system of adaptation make we human beings survive and travel from the peak of the mountain to deep of the sea; from the extremely cold weather of Artic to extremely dry air of the Desert. Thus, this ‘Ability of Adaptation’ make our body’s systems to change in order to suit with the environment. In fact, our body is adapting from time to time in order to adjust our body to the changing environment, for example: During the hot climate we sweat and our small blood vessels (capillaries) dilate to get rid of extra heat, in our brain there is a centre name themoregulatory centre which can sense the changes of the temperature. Thus, in hot climate, brain will give signals of thirst to us in order to direct us to increase the intake of water! In the case of water deprivation during the hot climate, kidneys are regulated so as to produce a more concentrated urine to decrease the loss of water from the body. In the opposite way : During the cold day, usually we won’t sweat (because sweating is the process to make us loss more heat and preserve heat). Furthermore, our skin’s small blood vessels (named capillaries) start to constrict (to become smaller in size to prevent the heat loss from the skin). In this case, the themoregulator centre in our brain did not send any signals to bring up the sensation to us, this indicate our body did not need any extra intake of water to compensate water loss. Here, we can see how amazing is our body created by God. Everyday, every hour, every minute, every seconds, our body need this ‘adaptation (in medical term we named Homeostasis)’ to survive in this planet earth. Without this system our body will fail, our life no longer exist.

Sorry for the brief introduction of what is ‘Adaptation ‘ above, it is somehow important our further understanding about how ‘Natural foods & Supplement’ can actually heals chronic diseases in later discussion. We (human beings) can adapt to changing environment; We can also repair our body by ourselves if we do provide our body with enough nutrients to let it repair itself. Do you believe it? Now, let me tell you {WHY our body needs it?}, {WHERE our body needs it?}, {WHAT our body needs?}, and {HOW it works to maintain our health}…..!

First of all, WHY our body needs it? Answer : Do you know our body needs food to generate energy for the activity of our everyday life? Actually, human’s body system did not programme to generate any energy. The statement above was absolutely incorrect. Our human’s body is just able to transfer energy from foods to our body. The true energy maker is our ‘Sun’, plants are the primary receiver of energy from Sun, then plants transfer energy to animal and human. We get the energy from plants and animal meat directly, or indirectly from Sun. Now, the key is while we get energy from the plants and animal in the form of foods, our body processes the foods in order to get energy. This process occurs in every single cells of our body. The process of transferring energy from foods to our body is called ‘Metabolism’. The worst thing now happens, metabolism is the process that can generate energy and also can create a lot of free radicles (free radicles are unstable electrons that will damage our body cells and tissue eventually). This radicles created in the cells can cause damage to the cells and cause damage to the DNA inside our cells. This detrimental process will finally cause cell death in long run. In 20 to 30 years this process everyday in our body to support our life because no matter what we still need energy to survive as a human beings stand on the special planet earth. Thus, after 20 to 30 years of cell death and renewing. Our body finally not able to produce new cells again due to the damage of the gene (DNA) of stem cells. Nevertheless, our body ended up with degeneration. All the systems fail. So, the main culprit here is the ‘Free Radicles’ that causes the diseases and failure of our body system. Therefore, we need natural foods and supplements that could scavenge the free radicles from our body.

Secondly, WHERE our body needs this Natural Foods and Supplement that can scavenge away the free radicles? The answer is : Everywhere in our body needs them to scavenge the free radicles because metabolism occurs in every cells in our body.

Thirdly, WHAT our body needs to scavenge away the free radicals? Answer is : Till this moment, I have not explained what is the Natural Foods and Supplement that can actually help us to cope with the free radicals. Common antioxydant behind this natural foods and supplements are ‘Vitamin A, C, E and Beta-Carotene’. Other antioxidant from foods are ‘Coenzyme Q10, Alpha-lipoic acid and colourful bioflavanoid antioxydants’. Some other supporting nutrients are also helped in maintaining good health such as ‘B-cofactor : Vitamin B1, B2, B6, B12 & Folic acid’ and ‘Antioxydant minerals : Copper, Zinc, Manganese, Selenium’. Besides, some major antioxidant defence system produced by body such as : Superoxide dismutase, Catalase, and Glutathione peroxidase’ are playing the fundamental roles in protecting our body. All these will be further explained later in our discussion. Those vitamins and some of the minerals are also called ‘Antioxydants’. ‘Oxydants’ are free radicals that could damage our body cells whereas the ‘Antioxydants’ are the agents that can wipe out or neutralize the oxydants to prevent our body cells from damaging effects of free radicals.

Lastly, HOW it works to maintain our health? Answer is : As soon as the free radicals are wiped out and neutralised by the Antioxydants, our body cells are less likely to be damaged by free radicals. Thus, we are encouraged to consume foods that contains more Antioxydants than foods that contain more free radicals. Perhaps, you may ask what are the foods that contain more antioxidants and what are the one contain free radicals? Now, I am going to list down a few for you. High antioxydants containing foods are vegetable, all kinds of fruits, fishes, steaming food. In contrary, foods containing a lot of free radicals are the deep frying foods, fried foods, grilled foods, BBQ foods. Honestly speaking, some of the foods are actually good for health, the culprit is the method of preparation that spoils out the food quality. That is why, when people enjoying Malay Sateh, BBQ foods, or Grilled foods, they usually eating with raw cucumber and raw onion. These two vegetable containing high antioxydants in it to prevent people to get sick easily after those grilled and BBQ foods.

Thus, after the above discussion, l guess everyone who read till this sentence already had a general idea of what is good and what is bad for our health! Now, l am going to discuss with you the function of Antioxydants. {Vitamin C : water soluble vitamin that target free radicals within the blood and plasma}, {Vitamin E : fat soluble antioxydants that target free radicals within the cellular membrane}, {Glutathione : Antioxydant produces by body cells and stores within the cells}, {Alpha-lipoic acid : work within the cell membrane and plasma}, {Vitamin C & Alpha-lipoic acid : have ability to regenerate Vitamin E and Glutathione}

From the Headline : ‘How Many of Us know….Foods and Supplements are actually the Best Medicine for the Sicks ?’ So, how the foods and Supplements that containing the elements stated at the previous few paragraphs can assist in fighting with the diseases? Again, our body has many smart systems that co-operate together to achieve the optimum level of health status as long as we provide enough and essential nutrients to our body. Amazingly, our body also has a very strong regeneration and recovery ability after our body got sick with the condition that we got enough rest and consume necessary nutrients for it to regenerate and recover itself. This also called ‘Food Medicine’. Later I will teach you how to eat and what to eat to achieve this divine purpose. In our society nowadays, many people are using ‘Food Medicine’ combining with ‘Medicine prescribed by the Medical doctor’ in curing the some chronic diseases, infectious diseases, or whatever kind of health disorders. Undoubtedly, this is a smart way for treatment. This method of treatment will give a double curing effects to the patient. ‘Food Medicine’ can give patient essential nutrients for the body to regenerate itself whereas the ‘Medicine prescribed by doctor’ help in fighting with the diseases and get rid of the agents or causes that bring the diseases. Forgot to say, one more importance to provide good nutrients to the body, that is good nutrients can help our body to boost up our immune system which in very important to defend our body from many infectious agents too. Here, l will further explain to you that ‘Food Medicine’ is like a military team that build up its strong reserve in its base. It prepare itself for any sudden need of military attacks. The more the backup bullets and weapon in its base the stronger the defensive power against the intruders! Now, try to imagine that our immune system is this military team that try to store up its weapon and bullets from the ‘Food Medicine’. Thus, good quality of foods or foods high in antioxidants do play fundamental roles in fighting with the diseases. By contrary, now what the ‘Medicine prescribed by doctors’ do here? Let me quote an example : let’s say Malaysia is now attacked by Country A, as for ‘Food Medicine’, Malaysia itself has their own military power to fight with Country A intruder (diseases agents) but what if Country A is too strong that Malaysia can’t even defend by its Military power (Immune system)? Now, Country Z may give military assistance (Medicine prescribed by doctor) to fight with the intruder that invade Malaysia. From here, we can see how Malaysia and Country Z co-operate together to fight with the Country A. On the other picture, we can see how our strong immune system can co-operate with Medicine prescribed by doctor to fight with the disease agents. Isn’t it clear? Thus, people who get sick not only must take medicine prescribed but also need adequate rest, good quality foods, and some of the essential supplements.

Now, I will let you know what supplement you should take, how you should take and why you need to take in different kinds of diseases. We can get some of the following antioxydants indirectly from fruits or vegetables that are enriched with it, some of them we can bought from the pharmacy in concentrated capsular form. Remember when we use the concentrated capsular form, we should follow the recommended dosage consume each day in order to prevent overdosage. Some of elements if use in overdosage will not cause any side effect but some will cause intoxication such as Vitamin A because they are fat soluble and will store in body continuously but some will not cause any side effect such as vitamin B & C because they are water soluble and they easily excreted from our body through our kidney.

Multiple Sclerosis

i)                    Antioxydant : Vitamin A, C, & E and Beta-Carotene

ii)                   Antioxydant minerals : Copper, Zinc, Manganase, Selenium.

iii)                 Grape seeds extract

iv)                 Coenzyme Q-10

 

Heart Disease (Inflammatory Heart disease : Carditis)

i)                    Vitamin C & E

ii)                   Glutathione : Patient who has coronary artery disease has lower level of glutathione within their cells compare to those without coronary artery disease. Thus, glutathione is the key antioxidant contain in all cell that surround the subendothelial space. When you take nutrients needed for cells to make glutathione (Selenium, Vitamin B2, Niacin, N-acetyl-L-cysteine), you can indirectly improve overall antioxidant defensive system.

iii)                 Bioflavanoids : found in fruits and vegetables. The more colourful the vegetable or fruit, the more bioflavanoids in them. Bioflavanoid has anti-allergen & anti-inflammatory effects. Red wine & grape juice have ‘polyphenols’ which decrease the formation of oxydized LDL to protect blood vessels’ endothelia. Grape seed is the best source of bioflavanoid antioxidant in preventing chronic inflammatory diseases.

*Remember : All antipxydants & Nutrients must be taken together in order to work synergically.

­Homocysteine Metabolism Disorder

-          Decrease of enzyme of metabolism of Homocysteine causing accumulation of Homocysteine in our body. This can cause Homocysteinuria (Homocysteine excreted in urine)

-          Increase of Homocysteine in our blood can cause increase of Cardiovascular diseases & Stroke.

-          Homocysteine is mainly from meat, egg, cheese, white flour, highly processed foods. It will be converted into Methionine and cysteine. This conversion needs Folic acid, Vitamin B6 & B12. If Homocysteine in excess there will extra accumulation of Methionine and Cysteine which is actually toxic to our body.

-          Thus, patients who has Cardiovascular disease caused by Homocysteine Metabolism disorder should be given Folic acid, Vitamin B6 & B12 in their diet.

Cardiomyopathy

i)                    Coenzyme Q-10

-          The Cardiomyopathy which has unknown cause has not been cured but in addition of nutrient Coenzyme Q-10, patient’s heart get its needed fuel source which allow heart to compensate for heart pumping insufficiency.

ii)                   How many of us know what is Coenzyme Q-10?

-          Coenzyme Q-10 / Ubiquinone : fat soluble vitamin or vitamin-like substance (potent antioxydants)

-          Organs, meats, beef, soy oil, sardine & peanuts contain trace amount of Coenzyme Q-10.

-          Coenzyme Q-10 needs 8 vitamins & several trace minerals to produce one molecule of Coenzyme Q-10.

-          Coenzyme Q-10 is the cofactor for at least 3 types of very important enzymes used within the mitochondrion of every cell.

-          Mitochondrion are the place where oxidative process occurs, this process is important to generate energy for every cell. All energies are generated here but the very dangerous by-product ‘Free Radicals’ are created here too during the process of energy production.

-          Patients with heart failure, heart diseases, periodontal diseases, diabetes, cancer, congestive heart failure and cardiomyopathy are also noticed with Coenzyme Q-10 defficiency.

-          Coenzyme Q-10 deficiency usually occurs in those with poor dietary regime, impairment of enzyme to synthesis Coenzyme Q-10 or excessive utility of Coenzyme Q-10.

-          In Cardiomyopathy, hen the heart muscle cells are weekened, the increase of intake of Coenzyme Q-10 will obviously improve the heart pumping function.

 

Cataract

-          Patient with cataract, antioxydants in early stage of treatment will preserve the lens function and will prevent further cataract formation caused by UV light of sun ray.

-          Natural antioxydants produce by our body (eg : Glutathione peroxidise, Catalase, Superoxide dismutase) form the primary eye’s defensive system. Unfortunately, if we only depend on the natural source of antioxydants to protect our eyes, it is obviously not enough.

-          Antioxydants found in the fluid around the lens are critical in protecting the lens. Most important one is Vitamin C. Others are Vitamin E, alpha-lipoic acids, Beta-catotene. They work synergically.

-          Alpha-lipoic acids and vitamin C regenerate Glutathione to use it again and again.

The Inflammatory Response

-          Eg: Asthma, Rheumatoid arthritis, Myocarditis

-          Antioxydants improve our immune system by help control inflammatory response by protect our body cells from inflammatory distruction.

-          What is the role of ‘Essential Fatty Acids’ in inflammatory response?

Our body use fats to produce healthy cell membrane and hormone ‘Prostaglandin’
Two most important fatty acids are 1) Omega-3 fatty acids ‘Alpha-linoleic acid’, Omega-3 produce Prostaglandin that can cause Anti-inflammatory effect 2) Omega-6 faty acids ‘Linoliec acids’, Omega-6 produces Prostaglandin that can cause inflammatory response.
Thus, optimal intake ratio is Omega-6 : Omega-3 = 4 : 1.
Omega-3 mainly coming from vegetable oils (Flaxseed, Canola, Pumpkin, Soybean oil), cold water fish (Markerel, Sardines, Salmon, Tuna)
Western diet has poor ratio, usually Omega-6 : Omega-3 = 20 : 1 or 40 : 1. Thus, they are more prone to inflammation.

Osteoarthritis, Rheumatoid Arthritis and Osteoporosis

-          Those who suffers from arthritis are deficient in several antioxydants and supporting nutrients : Vitamin B3, C, D, E, mineral Boron, Glucosamine sulphate, Essential fatty acids, Grape seed extract.

i)                    Glucosamine Sulphate (1500 – 2000mg/day, no side effect)

Glucosamine sulphate is the basic nutrient or the cartilage synthesis
It is simple amino sugar (Primary building block) of proteoglycans (proteoglycan is the molecule that give cartilage its elasticity)
Study showed that glucosamine sulphate not only reduced pain & inflammation of arthritis but also stop cartilage deterioration, it also causes cartilage re-growth and delay joint replacement treatment.

ii)                   Chondroitin sulphate

Chondroitin sulphate often combine with Glucosamine sulphate to get the better effect.
Chondroitin sulphate can also make up part of the proteoglycans and is responsible for attracting water into the cartilage to make cartilage more pliable and spongy. Without condroitin the cartilage will become drier and more fragile.
From the research study, scientists also get the conclusion that Glucosamine sulphate is more important than Chondroitin sulphate.

iii)                 Calcium

Calcium deficiency may lead to osteoporosis but only 25% of patients show effect by calcium supplement (800-1500mg)
Calcium & Vitamin D slow down Osteoporosis.

iv)                 Magnesium

Magnesium is important in several biochemical reaction take place within the bone.
Magnesium activate ‘Alkaline Phosphatase’ (enzyme in the process of new bone formation)
Magnesium is needed in conversion of inactive Vitamin D into active form of Vitamin D.

v)                  Vitamin D

Vitamin D is essential for calcium absorption. It can be produced in the skin when exposed in the sunlight.
Vitamin D in oral form can be fortified from foods and milk.
Everyone should take 500-800IU/day.

Alzheimer’s Disease

-          Increased oxidative stress more likely accounts for all aspects of Alzheimer’s disease. Patients with Alzheimer’s disease have significant depleted level of antioxydants in their brain as well as high level of oxidative stress.

i)                    High level of Vitamin E significantly decrease the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. Patients with moderate Alzheimer’s disease who took 2000IU Vitamin E in supplement able to remain at home for 2 – 3 years longer.

ii)                   Other antioxydants like Vitamin A, C, E, Zinc, Selenium, Rutin also can be used.

iii)                 Grape seeds extract is very potent antioxidant that can cross Blood Brain Barrier. Its concentration is increased in fluid, brain cells and nerve cells. Thus, it is the best antioxidant for the brain. (The key to protect brain is to use antioxidants and prevent from exposure to heavy metal)

From the explanation above, I am just managed to enclose some of the common diseases. There are dozen of them waiting to be tested and experimented. If anyone needs further details, can directly request from the commend section.

Now, we can see, there are actually many diseases can be treated together with supplements to get the optimal effect of treatment as long as we use it in the correct way, with the correct method, in the correct time. Do not ever overlook the power of foods and natural supplements. Very few of them can bring up the side effect to our body as long as we read the instruction and contraindication before we consume the supplement. All the best to whom benefits from this article. Do not hesitate to contact for any enquiry! Thanks! Good Luck!

mealmakeovermoms.com Liz Weiss, MS, RD is a dietitian and co-author of NO WHINE WITH DINNER and THE MOMS’ GUIDE TO MEAL MAKEOVERS. In this segment, she serves up the latest information on the top-20 antioxidant foods everyone should eat! Her Meal Makeover advice & cooking segments feature everything from practical tips for getting picky eaters to try their vegetables to healthy makeovers for chicken nuggets, fish sticks, fruit smoothies and other kid favorites. If you’re a mom (or dad) looking for easy ways to improve your family’s diet, be sure to visit www.MealMakeoverTV.com. To learn about Liz’s cookbook, check out www.MealMakeoverMoms.com
Video Rating: 4 / 5

Related Antioxidants Food Articles