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Superfoods for BrainpowerYour brain is the center of your universe. It controls every intentional motion you make, every thought you think, every nightmare that wakes you, and every pleasant dream that visits you in sleep. Without a moment's hesitation, it simultaneously and efficiently regulates a host of unconsidered actions like breathing, heartbeat, muscle contraction, and blinking. Whether you are adding a column of numbers or deciding in a split second how to swerve the car to avoid danger, you don't have to give a your brain a second thought: It is always on call for high-speed service. No wonder, then, that many people worry about brain-related problems like slowed reaction time and memory loss as they get older. And if someone in your family has had a stroke, it's likely that you will begin to worry about that, too. Keeping your brain in apple-pie working order and protecting it from stroke are high priorities for the young-at-heart and young-in-the-head who want to stay that way. But how can food help you do that? More than any other organ in the body, the brain depends on a continuous, oxygen-rich blood supply. That explains why a person becomes confused or loses consciousness during oxygen deprivation—and that's exactly what happens when blood flow to the brain is blocked during a stroke. While nourishment alone can't ensure that your brain will get all the oxygen it needs to keep you thinking young, the right foods can certainly help prevent a mind-altering stroke. According to the American Heart Association, atherosclerosis (clogged arteries) and high blood pressure are two of the leading causes of stroke. To discover why, just touch both of the arteries on either side of your Adam's apple—the carotid arteries—and imagine what happens when those pipelines carrying oxygen-rich blood to the brain are blocked. And even if they are only partially blocked by atherosclerosis, your stroke risk rises dramatically. So any foods you eat to help prevent atherosclerosis will also help to protect the awesome computer at the top of those pipelines. |
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Strive
for Five
Five a Day for Better Health is the national
nutrition program started in 1991 by the National Cancer Institute,
located in Bethesda, Maryland, and the Produce for Better Health
Foundation, a nonprofit industry partner. Look around, and you will
see their slogan appearing everywhere—from colorful logos on plastic
produce bags to handouts for public school educational programs.
Their hope is to get all Americans to eat at least five servings of
fruits and vegetables every day by the year 2000.
The goal is a noble one—no less than the health of
the entire nation. The basis of the effort comes from surveys
showing that people who get the most vegetables and fruits in their
diets have the lowest risk for many illnesses, including cancer and
heart disease.
The good news is that most American adults now
average about 41/2 servings of fresh produce per day—only a
half-serving away from the recommended 5. But children are still
lagging behind at only about 3 servings daily. "We don't quite
understand why children's consumption of fresh vegetables and fruits
hasn't increased in the same way as the adults'," says Linda
Nebeling, R.D., Ph.D., nutritionist with the Five a Day for Better
Health program. "We are putting a lot of focus now on getting kids
to eat just as many fruits and vegetables as their parents
do."
Here are some expert tips for fitting in five a
day.
Get some decent exposure. Just
being around fruits and veggies may make you eat more of them, says
Dr. Nebeling. "Put them at eye level in the fridge so that it's the
first thing you see when you look in there," she says. And that way
your kids will be more likely to crunch a carrot rather than a Clark
bar.
Try dried. Dry fruit is an
option that many people overlook. Just a quarter-cup raisins or a
quarter-cup dried apricots counts as a whole serving of fruit. Keep
dried fruit in your desk or send it to lunch in your child's
backpack. "It won't go bad on you, and it's a much better choice
than those sugary fruit leathers," says Dr. Nebeling.
Make a presentation of it. Stark
string beans staring from your plate aren't very exciting. But a
cozy bowl of homemade vegetable soup, some steamed Broccoli
draped with melted low-fat Cheddar, or a cool blueberry smoothie for
breakfast are anything but boring. The challenge is to add fruits
and vegetables to your diet in ways that make you want to eat more
of them. "We're not just talking about salad here," says Dr.
Nebeling.
Do a serving size-up. One
serving of vegetables or fruit is a lot smaller than most people
think, says Dr. Nebeling. A medium-size banana or apple, a half-cup
cut-up fruit, or just a quarter-cup dried fruit all count as a full
fruit serving. And a half-cup cooked beans or vegetables, or one cup
raw salad greens make the grade as a complete vegetable serving. So,
don't think you have to eat truckloads to hit that five-a-day mark,
says Dr. Nebeling. And remember, five is a minimum—more servings are
even better. High blood pressure—hypertension—is an even greater risk
factor than atherosclerosis, according to the American Heart Association.
And controlling blood pressure is the most important way to lower your
risk for stroke, says neurologist James L. Napier Jr., M.D., associate
clinical professor of medicine at Case Western Reserve University School
of Medicine in Cleveland.
Fortunately, blood pressure can often be controlled by
eating healthier, the American Heart Association reports, and you don't
need to eat boring, tasteless, unsalted food either. But you do need to
favor an ideal combination of food.
In a ground-breaking, nationwide diet and hypertension
study called the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) study,
researchers divided nearly 500 adults with and without high blood pressure
into three groups and fed each group a different diet. One group ate a
typical American diet that was low in fruits and vegetables but
accompanied by high-fat dairy products, so the total diet was high in fat
content. The second group ate a diet high in fruits and vegetables but
skipped the dairy foods. The third group was given a combination diet that
was high in fruits, vegetables, and low-fat dairy foods—overall, a low-fat
diet with ample dairy in it. Sodium intake averaged about three grams
daily in all groups, and all participants maintained their usual weight
during the study.
"The combination diet produced striking reductions in
blood pressure," says researcher Lawrence J. Appel, M.D., associate
professor of medicine, epidemiology, and international health at Johns
Hopkins University in Baltimore. All types of people benefited—not just
men or women or people of only one race—and within just two weeks of
starting the diet. "If all Americans ate this way, the returns could be
huge," he concludes. |
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