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People with Diabetes are prone to plaque in the arteries. Grape seed extract is safe and beneficial for people with Diabetes. Here’s what you need to know in the last part of our Diabetes and Grape Seed Extract podcast series.
In part 2, Jerry Hickey, Ph. discusses the number of things Grape Seed Extract can do for you if you have diabetes, including studies that show its benefit for blood pressure and vision health.
Invite Health Podcast, Episode hosted by Jerry Hickey. Ph
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People with Diabetes have many issues related to inflammation. Comorbidity is a term that refers to diseases and conditions caused by the original disease. Diabetes has numerous comorbidities. Grape seed is a great supplement for people with diabetes. The pip (seed) of white grapes is loaded with very powerful antioxidants that reduce cellular inflammation. Collectively, these antioxidants are known as OPCs, oligomeric pro. Grape seed extract has GRAS certification – Generally Recognized As Safe for use by the American public, according to the FDA.
What is Metabolic Syndrome?
Metabolic Syndrome is a health disaster but it can be helped, especially with Grape Seed Extract. This is a cluster of conditions, including elevated blood pressure, elevated blood sugar, high cholesterol, obesity, elevated triglycerides, fatty liver, plaque developing the arteries, inflammation developing in the arteries, elevated uric acid, chronic kidney disease and eye issues. This is why this condition will shave years – perhaps decades – off of your health and your lifespan.
The Impact Uric Acid Has On Your Body. Listen Now >
Initially, animal studies demonstrated that Grape Seed Extract does many things for people with diabetes. Diabetes effects the heart, blood vessels, kidneys, the liver, the eyes, the brain, nerves. In people with Metabolic Syndrome, diabetes and pre-diabetes, Grape seed extract has been shown to help lower blood sugar, blood pressure and improve blood flow and the health of your arteries and more.
Clinical Research
The Diabetes and Endocrinology Department at Queen Alexandra Hospital in England published a study in the journal Diabetic Medicine where researchers studied obese patients with diabetes, who are at high risk of heart disease. Participants were given Grape Seed Extract (600mg) everyday versus placebo. Grape seed extract reduced fructosamine within two weeks. This is a quick measure of blood sugar; normally, people with diabetes prick their fingertip everyday to take a little blood and check their sugar to give them an indication of the measure of their blood sugar. Fructosamine is a little better, because it gives you a two week panoramic view of your average blood sugar. So, Grape seed was improving blood sugar very quickly in this study. It was also shown to reduce inflammation in the participants body.
Why you should test your inflammation using a hs-CRP Blood Test >>
The Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry from Oregon State University compared a prescription drug – a sugar blocker called Acarbose – to Grape Seed Extract. Acarbose is given before meals and it bonds to a family of enzymes called Alpha-amylase that breakdown carbohydrates and you absorb less sugar from the meal. If you absorb less sugar and slower, it is easier for someone with diabetes or pre-diabetes to control their blood sugar levels. The study found that Grape seed extract was stronger than the prescription for blocking this enzyme and it also blocked the second family of sugar blockers called alpha glucosidase.
So, taking a Grape Seed Extract – 100mg to 300mg – before a meal with a glass of water is going to reduce your absorption of sugar. Now, this extract has not been studied for weight loss to my knowledge but obviously, if you absorb less sugar that will block calorie absorption which should help you lose some weight. But studies have shown that it helps control blood sugar levels, as seen above.
Pharmacognosy Magazine published a small study of healthy men and women who were given Grape Seed Extract at both 100mg and 300mg before a high carbohydrate breakfast, which included a sugary drink, six pieces of white bread with sugary jelly. When participants were given Grape Seed extract, it strongly reduced the absorption of sugar following the high carbohydrate breakfast.
The University of Alberta published a study in the Journal Phytotherapy Research – a review of 50 human clinical trials. It is a meta-analysis of 50 studies. Grape seed extract was shown to have a significant impact; improving fasting blood glucose, total cholesterol, reduced bad cholesterol, reduce triglycerides. and reduced inflammation in the heart.
In Part 2, we will be looking at how Diabetes impacts your body, including eye health, plaque and more. Stay tuned!
Thank you for tuning in to the Invite Health Podcast. You can find all of our episodes for free wherever you listen to podcasts or by visiting www.invitehealth.com/podcast. Make sure you subscribe and leave us a review! Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram at Invite Health today. We’ll see you next time on another episode of the Invite Health Podcast.
Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome, or PCOS, is one of the most common hormonal problems, impacting up to 12% of all women. Here’s what you need to know about nutrients that can be beneficial.
Strokes are quite common and are a leading cause of loss of mobility and independence. Yet many strokes are preventable by making simple adjustments to your lifestyle and changing some of the foods you eat.
Invite Health Podcast, Episode hosted by Jerry Hickey. Ph
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Today we are going to discuss the topic of Vitamin D and your immune system. Vitamin D literally unites your immune system and mounts a better defense against infections. It also helps your immune system work in a more balanced way, making it very important during cough and cold season and in the protection of your lungs.
The Vitamin D & Immune System Connection
At one time, health professionals thought that Vitamin D could only be activated by our kidneys. But when Vitamin D is looked at after a blood test, they are looking at the form that is stored in your liver. It is released and lasts about two weeks in the blood stream. It has to go to your kidneys to be fully activated. This active form only lasts for about an hour or so. So, when your doctor is looking at your Vitamin D levels they are actually looking at an inaccurate form that still has to go through the process of becoming the active form. The interesting thing is, everyone one of our white blood cells can actually activate Vitamin D. This shows you how important this vitamin is for our immune system function.
If the immune system is overactive, it creates inflammation. This is serious and dangerous. For instance, during the COVID-19 Coronavirus pandemic, people are winding up in the intensive care unit when it attacks their lungs, as it is causing a build up of fluid in the lungs and increasing blood pressure in the lungs and is causing pneumonia. It could cause such a tremendous backlash by the immune system that the immune system itself can start destroying lung tissue.
If the immune system is too weak, you will be more at risk of having infections. You simply will not be able to fight off infections. Vitamin D impacts both of these – a weak immune system and an overactive immune system. It helps the immune system work appropriately so it is a strong enough fight against the infection, allowing just enough defense to protect you, while preventing immune system from becoming out of control.
The Immune Network is a journal that publishes peer-reviewed studies that report novel findings in regards to your immune system. If you search Vitamin D on their website, you will find 260 unique studies. One of them is extremely important, that was released very recently and right at the start of COVID-19 in February – Vitamin D-Cathelicidin Axis: at the Crossroads between Protective Immunity and Pathological Inflammation during Infection. You can find it by clicking here. The report explains how Vitamin D activates Cathelicidin in order for the immune system to function correctly, driving each other to kill infections, yeast, fungus or bacteria better. It connects the innate and adaptive immune systems.
Read more about the function of your innate and adaptive immune systems by clicking here >>
Clinical Studies on Vitamin D for Immunity
An announcement from the National Institute of Health reports, in 2009 there was a report that a low level of Vitamin D in your blood is connected to frequent infections, including cold, flu and viral infections. Separately, there was a big analysis of human clinical trials in 2017; these were prospective clinical trials that included thousands of participants. Published in the British Medical Journal by research from Queen Mary University in London, The University of Colorado and Winthrop University of Mineola, NY in a number of well-reported and designed studies, found that taking a Vitamin D supplement reduces your odds of developing a respiratory tract infection by approximately 42%, in participants who originally had low Vitamin D levels. Researchers found that if Vitamin D was low and they brought it back up to normal levels, this helped to reduce your risk of a respiratory tract infection pretty strongly.
There is a sweet spot for Vitamin D in your blood. It seems the best level to help support healthy lungs and overall respiratory health in general, is a level of about 50-53. So, you want to aim for the range of 35-75.
The University of Colorado did their own study on about 19,000 adults and kids. They found that Vitamin D levels dropped greatly during the winter months, which is not unusual. These researchers found that having a low level of Vitamin D in your blood increases your risk of developing the flu by 43%. In the same study, people with respiratory tract disease like asthma has a 5x greater risk of a flu infection if they were low in Vitamin D. This study also found that taking this vitamin daily or weekly was more effective than taking it one or two large doses.
Why Vitamin D is Essential For Lung Health. Click here to listen now >>
My Recommendation
The issue is that right now, you cannot depend on the sun to bring your Vitamin D levels up to normal. You need to take a supplement and that is extremely important. Make sure it’s Vitamin D3, which has been shown to work better than Vitamin D2 according to several studies. And do not get it in one or two huge doses. You have to take it either weekly or every day to get that support for your lungs and your immune system.
If you have not been taking Vitamin D all winter, you need to raise your levels right now. Chances are they are very low; too low to protect you from infection or to protect your lungs. You want to get your Vitamin D levels above 35. I would recommend taking about 6,000 units every day with food for seven days. After that, you can go down to 3,000 units a day. This should get you up to a nice sweet level pretty quickly. For more information, speak with your doctor or one of our healthcare professionals today. You can email us at nutritionists@invitehealth.com to connect with us today or visit www.invitehealth.com to live chat with us without leaving your home!
Thank you for tuning in to the Invite Health Podcast. You can find all of our episodes for free wherever you listen to podcasts or by visiting www.invitehealth.com/podcast. Make sure you subscribe and leave us a review! Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram at Invite Health today. We’ll see you next time on another episode of the Invite Health Podcast.