Natural Health Supplements
These days, you can’t be too concerned about your health. With possible toxins and lower nutritional values found in the foods we eat and the things we drink, many people have taken to buying supplements to help aid their health. Here’s a list of natural health supplements that can lead you to a more sound and healthy way of life:
Saint John’s Wort: Used for over 2,000 years, this supplement is a simple plant that can greatly aid depression. One of the most widely used natural health supplements, in a double-blind clinical study, Saint John’s Wort was proven to be equally as effective as pharmaceutical antidepressants, while giving less side-effects then their drug company counterpart.
Bee pollen: People take bee pollen in supplement form to help increase energy and vitality. In addition to offering several required vitamins and minerals, bee pollen acts as an enhancer to the immune system, as well as being a useful tool in cleansing the body of harmful toxins.
Athletes have been known to take bee pollen regularly to help enhance their endurance, stamina, recovery time from exercise, and more. It may also prove to be helpful in alleviating the pesky symptoms of hay fever. With all these possible uses of bee pollen, it’s amazing to find out that it can also be used to aid in weight loss. A substance in the pollen known as lecithin helps to stimulate your metabolism and flush fat from your system. This is another one of the most widely used natural health supplements.
Fish Oil:
Harvested from the bodies of fish, fish oil is purified through a scientific process and turned into supplement form. Containing Omega-3 fatty acids, these natural health supplements can have numerous effects on your body for the better. For one, fish oil can aid in preventing the onset of Alzheimer’s disease. It has also been associated with better memory, clearer thinking, and health of the heart.
One of the best nutrients for brain health, this supplement’s effect on your body can be vast. Be sure to only purchase pharmaceutical grade fish oil, however, since this is the process which removes the heavy metals found in fish due to pollutants. If your fish oil is not pharmaceutical grade, you run the risk of consuming such dangerous materials as mercury.
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Are the Health Supplements Safe
Health supplements are now a common addition to our diet and in many situations they are the only solution to our health problems. However the Internet is simply flooded by SPAM and pop-up advertisements promising a quick relief from various illnesses if only we take (put a name here) health diet supplement and they are treated more and more like some kind of wonder pills. On the other hand, the benefits and dangers of using them are more and more discussed among physicians. The use of various supplements in bodybuilding process and the dangers of abusing them do not help.
The point is that health supplement really do work, but not for everybody and certainly they’re not for every occasion.
Nutritional deficiencies
Basically dietary health supplements were originally developed to help people overcome their nutritional deficiencies. If, for any reason, an individual is unable to follow a balanced diet, health supplements help them to keep your organism intact. However in most cases when an individual eats healthy food (a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables. For example), health supplements are no longer needed and taking them will have only little effect (and not always a positive one).
Bodybuilding/fitness
Another common reason of taking health supplements is bodybuilding. When we want more than to be fit, the normal diet is not enough and we need to take something more serious if we hope to keep up the unhealthily quick pace of the muscles grow. That’s where the health supplements come. However as they are often taken without any medical knowledge (and they need to be taken in large quantities if they are to have a visible effect), their final effects may no longer be positive.
Conclusion
In short, health supplements are OK, but only as long as people use them for the reasons they were made for – to fight nutritional deficiencies. Bodybuilding or the general need of feeling healthy are not good reasons for taking those pills (even herbal ones). Our body is a delicate mechanism and we shouldn’t tinker in it too much without a serious reason.
Joanne Wright is a certified nutritionist specializing in proper use of nutritional supplements. She maintains an informational website on vitamins and their usage.
http://www.ahealthiersolution.com
Me and Omega 3
I have never liked fish. In fact, other then Tuna, mixed with mayo and chopped onions, I would say I am afraid of fish. I was once a lifeguard at a lake and every time I had to go in the water, I would move my arms and legs around like I was having a seizure just to keep the little fish in the lake away. I am in fact afraid of all sea life from Trout to Goldfish, so you can imagine my response when my doctor suggested taking fish oil. He gave me a copy of an article about the value of Omega 3 fish oil pills in reducing the risk of heart attacks. I was unimpressed and when evaluating taking the fish pills verses the heart attack, I chose the heart attack.
At my next visit, my doctor asked if I had tried the fish pills and when I wrinkled my nose and shook my head, he produced another article suggesting that there was a link between a reduction in cancer and the fish pills. Still I chose cancer.
He then suggested that flax seed oil was a worthy alternative to the fish pills and would provide me with the same omega 3 fatty acids, that he so desperately thought I needed. I had recently seen my mother munching on some flax seed chips, which pretty much closed the door on the flax seed option.
You can then imagine my joy when I recently read that there was little to suggest that Omega 3 fatty acids reduced the risk of any single type of cancer.
While it was true that the Eskimos of Greenland had a very low occurrence of coronary heart disease (I assume they ate a lot of fish), I was overjoyed to hear that high levels of mercury were discovered in fish. Swordfish, shark and mackerel had particularly large amounts of mercury, however fish sticks did not. Regardless I had found the evidence I needed and in future doctor visits whenever the issue was raised, I would invoke the findings from an ambiguous EPA study that supported my growing concern of getting mercury poisoning. In truth, I still don’t actually know why mercury is bad for you but as sited in the Fishing Regulations Booklet, if I need more information, I can always contact my local health department.
Robyn Segal is a free lance writer and Director of Marketing for a New England Health Care System.