Health Benefits of Turmeric: Curcumin

Turmeric & Back Pepper - Optimize Your Diet Part 4

This post is a part of my Optimize Your Diet | Food Pairing series. In this series my goal is to identify foods that we all eat every day and show you how you can eat these foods in a way that is better for your health.

Previously in part one of this series I discussed the cancer fighting attributes of lycopene as it is found in tomatoes and how fats make lycopene more bioavailable in your body, thus allowing for more cancer fighting action. In this series I will discuss the exact same process but with the spice, turmeric rather than tomatoes. In fact an optimal food pairing of turmeric makes its active and desired polyphenol 1,000 times more bioavailable. That’s pretty significant if you ask me… especially if you want to reap the medicinal benefits in addition to the tastiness of this spice.

Benefits of Turmeric - Curcumin
The spice turmeric, typically used in Asian curry dishes and Middle Eastern cuisine is well known to have many medicinal uses. Its anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial effects traits have been well studied and clinical research is ongoing in investigating the possible benefits of turmeric on fighting and preventing various cancers and diseases such as Breast Cancer, Alzheimer's Disease, and Arthritis among others. Only recently have we understood however that it’s the curcurmin in turmeric that has the ability to fight and prevent disease and research into curcurmin is accelerating.

Until further studies verify many beliefs of the disease preventative effects of adding curcurmin to your diet you might want to get started adding turmeric to more of your meals. A well stocked spice rack probably already has this spice sitting in it and if not it can be found at virtually any market. You don’t even have to find your local Asian market to get your hands on turmeric.

Curcumin And Pepper
The problems however of using turmeric to improve your health is that the active and desirable polyphenol curcurmin is only 3 percent of the spice, and what is actually there has very low bioavailability, meaning your body won’t absorb most of the curcurmin it takes in. That means you really aren’t getting much of the good stuff when you sprinkle turmeric into your sauté pan. To really get the full benefit of this spice you have to make your body accept it and that’s where black pepper comes in.

If you are going to be using turmeric in your cooking anyway, say you’re making curries, or adding the spice to rice or any other dish, you can, and should, optimize your diet by adding black pepper to the mix as well. Black pepper contains an agent called piperine which increases the bioavailability of curcurmin by 1-2 thousand percent. This means that you could eat 1000th the amount of turmeric and still get the disease fighting effects that you would have with a normal quantity without black pepper. This effectually means two things.

You can add a very small amount of turmeric to most any food with a dash of black pepper and get the medicinal benefit all the time without substantially changing the flavor of your foods or you can add black pepper to your normal turmeric spiced dishes to supercharge the disease fighting properties of those dishes. The choice is up to you.

Personally I like the idea of adding a pinch of this mix to most of my sautéed vegetables or rice. I always spice them up anyway so why not use turmeric and pepper; it doesn’t take much after all to optimize your diet. A little prevention goes a long way in life.

Alternatively you can simply buy a Curcumin supplement and take that regularly. You will still have bioavailability issues but taking your supplement with meals including black pepper can help with that. There are many supplements out there but this Curcumin Supplement by Jarrow has a lot of positive reviews and may be a good curcumin supplement for you to check out.

I hope you enjoyed this post, if so I’d encourage you to check out the first three installments of Optimize Your Diet. Each deals with food pairings and disease prevention with many of the foods you probably already eat anyway.

Here’s to having a longer life!

Source
UCLA Newsroom, Oct. 2006 - http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/UCLA-VA-Study-Finds-Chemical-Found-7366.aspx?RelNum=7366
Clinical Cancer Research, Oct. 2005 - http://clincancerres.aacrjournals.org/cgi/content/full/11/20/7490

List of Low Radiation Cell Phones

A while back I posted on some recent findings that showed that cell phones can increase your risk for brain tumors. What I didn't include in that article was a list of popular current phones that that will minimize your chances for developing these tumors based on the amount of radiation the phones emitted. I understand that basing your purchase on this level of precaution is bordering on extreme but I'm sure some will find it particularly useful.

Caveat: This list is subject to change at any time and the stats provided are as published from other sources. I can not verify their accuracy beyond that nor can I perfectly keep this list current. Please do not rely on this information completely without doing your own due diligence as appropriate.

Phones Emitting The Least Radiation

Model - SAR Level

1. Beyond E-Tech DUET D8 (0.109)
2. Samsung Eternity SGH-A867 (0.194)
3. Samsung SGH G800 (0.23)
4. Samsung Soul (0.24)
5. Samsung Impression a877 (0.27)
6. Samsung i8510 INNOV8 (0.287)
7. Beyond E-Tech DUET D888 (0.32)
8. Samsung t229 (0.383)
9. Samsung a1675 Airtime Credit (0.452)
10. Samsung I450 (0.457)
11. Samsung Rugby a837 (0.46)
12. Samsung Propel Pro i627 (0.473)
13. Samsung Gravity t459 (0.487)
14. Samsung Alias2 U750 (0.541)
15. AT&T Quickfire Phone (0.563)
16. Sonim XP1 (0.6)
17. Motorola RAZR2 V9 (0.61)
18. Samsung Magnet a257 (0.637)
19. Motorola Renegade V950 (0.66)
20. LG CF360 (0.676)

Source
CNET Reviews

Disclaimer
Links in this list are affiliate links.

Vitamin Supplements Can Worsen Prostate Cancer

Increase in Risk of Fatal Prostate Cancer

There has been a number of studies over the years suggesting a link between multivitamin usage and fatal prostate cancer however a recent study published in May of 2007 in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute tracked more than 300,000 men where roughly 100,000 took a daily multivitamin and 15,000 of which took more than one a day. The results of the study showed that those who took the vitamins more than once a day had a rate of fatal prostate cancer within five years at roughly twice the rate of everybody else.

Multivitamins In Moderation

Furthermore, the most interesting part of the findings (in my opinion at least) is that the risk was unchanged for those who took a multivitamin once a day. It didn’t matter if they cut the vitamins out completely; it only mattered if they took them either in high doses or too often. Additionally, "the researchers found no link between multivitamin use and early-stage prostate cancer. The researchers speculate that perhaps high-dose vitamins had little effect until a tumor appeared, and then could spur its growth."

Based on these findings I’m led to speculate as I always enjoy doing. If vitamins, even in high doses, do not have an effect on early stage tumor growth but they do have an effect on fatal, late stage tumor growth then they likely have nothing to do with the creation of the tumor but have much to do with the growth of a tumor once it forms. Therefore; if you have prostate cancer then it is probably in your best interest to lay off the vitamin supplements as they might be feeding the tumor.

Treatment of Prostate Cancer

Doctors, in the case of early-stage prostate cancer treatment, often prescribe no treatment because the tumors are slow growing. In some cases it has even been shown that simple low-dose aspirin treatment can keep PSA scores in check just as Aspirin can help fight heart conditions. Other people even find benefit in taking an over the counter prostate formula.  Whatever eases your mid should be just fine.

Bottom Line

If there’s one thing to remember, however, it is that vitamin supplements are not inherently bad for you it’s the quantity that can be harmful. Like everything else in life moderation is the most important thing. They’re called One-A-Day for a reason. You can’t just eat cake for all your meals. You have to moderate and stay diversified.

Source
Journal of the National Cancer Institute, May 2007
Fox News Online, May 2007 - http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,272837,00.html

Can Cell Phones Cause Brain Tumors?

Cell phone usage and brain tumors have been synonymous in the speculative association of cell users for at least the last twenty years. In that time popular wisdom has told us that we are safe however long-term scientific studies on brain tumors and cell phone usage has been lacking until recently.

Cell Phones & Brain Tumors

As reported in Best Life magazine, February 2008:

"More research has linked the microwaves emitted by cell phones with brain tumors. This study, published in the journal Occupational Environmental Medicine, was the first to analyze the effects of cell phone use over 10 years or more, and the results are sobering. Researchers found that mobile phone users are twice as likely to develop malignant, difficult to treat brain tumors called gliomas. The advice? Keep mobile phone conversations short and use a land line whenever possible."

Reduce Odds of Brian Tumors

To add my personal opinion I'll say that when cell phone usage is directed through a bluetooth earpiece the effects of the damage are likely far diminished as the phone is not touching the head. This is just an assumption but I believe it is spot on and a fair compromise in a world where cell phone usage will not be dropping any time soon. Use your earpieces!

UPDATE: 8/16/2009: I recently posted a list of the 20 lowest radiation cell phones. Using one of these phones with an earpiece will probably be your best defense to to the increased risk for brain tumors. Check it out.

Invitation

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Source
Occupational Environmental Medicine