Truth about sugar and fat

THE GOOD AND THE BAD: LEARN THE TRUTH ABOUT FAT AND SUGAR

by Dr. Josh Axe 27.06.2018

Over the past few decades, the diet industry has waged a fierce war on fat, leading consumers to believe that cutting down on your consumption of fat is the key to weight loss. However, it’s good to know that not all fats are unhealthy and that, on the other hand, many “healthy, low-fat foods” sometimes do more harm than good in the fight for your overall health.

If you take a stroll through just about any supermarket, you’re bound to encounter an endless array of suspicious “healthy” foods. They may have been slapped with a “fat-free” or “reduced fat” label, but they may actually do more harm than good.

What the diet industry doesn’t tell you is that these low-fat foods are usually pumped full of preservatives, additives, and extra sugar intended instead to boost flavor and enhance palatability.

Not only can added sugar be even more detrimental than fat when it comes to your weight, but it can also take a toll on just about every other aspect of health as well.

Plus, by cutting down on your fat intake, you may actually be eliminating the many potential health benefits that healthy fats can provide (listed below).

Many consumers are left wondering – what has a more negative effect on your health – fat or sugar?

NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF SUGAR CONSUMPTION

·         Sugar has been shown to trigger inflammation, which is actually at the root of most diseases. Why? Sustaining high levels of inflammation long-term has been linked to an increased risk of several chronic conditions, such as heart disease, diabetes, and autoimmune disorders. ⁽¹⁾

·         Recent research also suggests that loading up on added sugar might heighten your risk of cancer. There is an indirect link between sugar and cancer risk, mostly due to the fact that obesity heightens your risk for many types of cancer. 

·         As you may already know, sugar consumption has also been associated with a higher risk of obesity, insulin resistance, and metabolic syndrome, all of which can kick up your risk of chronic disease. 

·         Sugar is highly addictive, which can make it nearly impossible to quit cold turkey. Why? Sugar stimulates the release of dopamine, a neurotransmitter that controls the reward and pleasure centers of the brain, simultaneously causing a slew of sugar withdrawal symptoms when you finally do decide to cut back on your sugar intake.

Keep in mind:

These negative health effects are limited to added sugars found in processed and unhealthy foods like baked goods, sugary sweets, and soft drinks.

GOOD SUGARS (AND FATS)

Plenty of healthy foods like fruits contain natural sugars, but they also supply a host of important micro nutrients as well as fibre, which can slow the absorption of sugar and negate any potential negative effects on health.

But while added sugar is universally considered unhealthy across the board, fat is actually an incredibly important part of the diet and can come with a long list of health benefits.

BENEFITS OF HEALTHY FAT

·         Unsaturated fatty acids found in foods like avocados, olive oil, and almonds can actually boost heart health, lower cholesterol levels, and alleviate inflammation.

·         Certain saturated fatty acids such as coconut oil may also have health benefits and have been linked to better brain function and increased fat burning (if eaten according to a planned calorie intake). 

·         And while it may seem counter intuitive, upping your intake of healthy fats can also slow gastric emptying, keeping you feeling fuller for longer to ward off cravings and amp up weight loss.

However, not all fats are created equal.

THE NOT-SO-HEALTHY FATS

While fats found in whole, unprocessed foods such as nuts, seeds, and oils are jam-packed with benefits, the fats found in highly processed foods are not at all good for your health. Trans fats, for example, are found primarily in processed foods, and hydrogenated vegetable oils have been associated with a wide range of negative health conditions such as heart disease and diabetes. Steer clear and stick to healthier sources of fats instead to help optimize your health.

FAT VS. SUGAR – WHAT’S THE ANSWER?

The healthiest and most sustainable way to improve your health is to make minor changes for healthier choices. Sugar is highly addictive and has been associated with a number of adverse effects on health. Healthy fats, on the other hand, are an essential part of the diet and may actually aid in weight loss, improve heart health and reduce inflammation. For this reason, it’s best to swap the sugar out of your diet and fill up on healthy fats instead.

Remember:

Even if some fats are considered healthy, it’s best to eat them in moderation if you want to lose weight. Adjusting your calorie intake is crucial for weight loss, and fats, even the healthy ones, have a lot of calories.

If you want to become your healthiest self, opt for foods like:

·         coconut oil

·         avocados

·         extra-virgin olive oil

·         grass-fed butter

·         fatty fish

·         nutrient-rich nuts and seeds

I also suggest skipping the sugar from processed foods, sugar-sweetened juices, energy drinks or sodas, and other unhealthy sources.

If you do need to add a hint of sweetness to your favourite baked goods or beverages, select natural sweeteners like:

·         raw honey

·         stevia

·         dates

Not only can these ingredients supply a bit of extra flavor, but they also contain vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants that make them a much better alternative to plain, white, processed sugar.

Disclaimer:

The content of this blog is for informational purposes only. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any question you may have regarding a medical condition. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call your doctor immediately. Opt4health does not recommend or endorse any specific tests, physician, products, procedures, opinions, or other information that may be mentioned on the Opt4health blog. Reliance on any information provided by Opt4health, Opt4health employees, other contributors appearing on the blog at the invitation of Opt4health, or other visitors to the blog is solely at your own risk.

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Link Between Happiness and Stress

LINK BETWEEN HAPPINESS AND STRESS

By Elizabeth Scott, MS

Updated May 02, 2019

One challenging aspect of stress is that it can pile up: activities that are mildly stressful can feel overwhelming when you are experiencing too much stress in other areas. Fortunately, it’s also true that small spurts of stress relief can accumulate, and can add up to increased resilience. One potential challenge that many people face when stressed and busy, however, is that they feel they lack the time or energy to practice some of the most stress-relieving and resilience-promoting activities when they need them the most.

For example, exercise is an extremely effective stress reliever, and can even build energy in the long run, but many people find it too difficult to face a workout when they’re already exhausted. Meditation can be an extremely calming activity that can also build resilience, but sometimes sitting quietly can seem to amplify stressful thoughts. (There are ways around both of these issues, but many people find it easier to simply give up.)

This is why it is such great news that bursts of happiness can lead to greater resilience toward stress. Many of the things that can lift our moods—playing with a pet, watching a funny video, or even eating chocolate, for example—are quick and easy to fit into one’s day. Savouring these experiences can expand on the benefits you’ll already experience. Read on to find out how this actually works, and then I’ll share with you some more strategies for lifting your mood.

Psychologist Barbara Fredrickson, through what is known as the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions has pioneered a branch of study that has found that positive emotions such as joy, contentment, or appreciation carry independent and lasting benefits. Instances of elevated mood (or increased happiness) broaden one’s perspective and behavioural repertoire and build lasting personal resources including mindfulness, resilience, closer relationships, and even improved physical health as well as lower levels of depression and higher levels if life satisfaction.

Enjoying the Benefits of Happiness

What does all of this have to do with stress management? This branch of research shows how happiness and stress relief are connected: doing little things to lift your mood really can have a lasting effect on your resilience toward stress. Each time you do something nice for yourself, you’re taking a step toward feeling less stressed now and in the future, and enjoying other benefits as well! Here is some more of what the research in this area has to say.

• Good Moods Lead to Increased Resources: Several studies have found that positive emotions create a greater likelihood of creating resources to support social connection, and increase your ability to manage stress. While negative emotional states can lead to a “tunnel vision” experience where people focus so much on the negative that they miss opportunities in their lives, people experiencing happiness are more likely to build personal resources that are linked with resilience toward stress, including personal resilience, interpersonal resources like supportive friends, and practical resources like a secure financial situation. This increase in resources leads to more frequent good moods, and an upward spiral is created, which leads to benefits in health, happiness, and life satisfaction.
• These Resources Are Numerous: A study of 99 college students measured mood over the past week and gave subjects a battery of personality tests and questionnaires found that positive mood predicted greater resources in coping and resilience (as demonstrated by higher GPAs and other achievements), higher quality relationships, better health, and greater resilience. Those with more negative moods scored lower in these areas.
• Positive Mood Can Help Improve Emotional Health: One study even found that increases in a good mood (also known as “positive affect”) may counteract unhappy or fearful states characteristic of mood disorders such as those involving anxiety, depression, or schizophrenia. (Note: if you are experiencing these disorders, it is also important to work with your therapist or talk to your doctor; this is not meant to replace the advice of a professional, but to supplement.)
• Bottom Line: Ultimately, a review of the literature—a study of many studies—found that positive mood and positive thinking increase one’s ability to manage stress in healthy ways, which leads to improved health outcomes such as increased immunity and longevity, as well as improved lifestyle factors such as greater job satisfaction.

So how can a stressed and busy person work these good moods into a packed schedule, you may be wondering? There are several strategies that work, and activities that you know make you happy (with few negative consequences, of course) are a great place to start.

Disclaimer:

The content of this blog is for informational purposes only. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any question you may have regarding a medical condition. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call your doctor immediately. Opt4health does not recommend or endorse any specific tests, physician, products, procedures, opinions, or other information that may be mentioned on the Opt4health blog. Reliance on any information provided by Opt4health, Opt4health employees, other contributors appearing on the blog at the invitation of Opt4health, or other visitors to the blog is solely at your own risk.

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CORONAVIRUS STRESS: MANAGING STRESS AND CONCERNS

March 10, 2020 – Vanderbilt University Medical Center

By James Kendall, LCSW, CEAP, Manager, Work/Life Connections – EAP

As coronavirus (COVID-19) news spreads, it has created stress for many of us. For others, it has added to existing anxieties. Sensationalized stories add to our angst and panic. The stock market has responded with a downturn, and many are unsure whether to travel or attend social gatherings. It may be similar to our response to other stressful world events: HIV, H1N1, SARS, mass shootings and 9/11.

It is healthy to have a respect for the COVID-19, the Flu and other communicable diseases, but we need not panic.  Accurate information, preparation and evidence-based practice are powerful tools. 

Keep Perspective: Find information about COVID-19 from reliable sources: the CDC, NIH, Discovery Health and World Health Organization. Learning what is known about this virus is helpful in combating anxiety, speculation and the media frenzy.

Be Prepared: If you have direct patient contact, arm yourself with the facts and review protocols which are in place that apply to infectious diseases. Engage in training specific to the COVID-19 virus as warranted. Get your annual flu shot. Wash your hands, frequently, with soap and water for at least 20 seconds. Use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer that contains at least 60% alcohol if soap and water are not available.

Limit News Overexposure: Limit the time you listen to news about the virus. Sensational news stories can perpetuate unnecessary anxiety. Participate in Healthy Activities: Engage in the lifestyle that encourages resilience and a healthy balance between work and home life:

·         Eat a healthy diet and get regular exercise

·         Get enough rest

·         Seek enjoyment (Stop and appreciate the things that are important to you: family; nature; music; etc.)

·         Enjoy moments (a smile; the smell of a flower; a cup of coffee; reading a good book; petting your dog; a movie; time with friends and family; etc.)

·         Avoid too much direct body contact where possible

·         Wash your hands after being and during public excursions (be aware lift buttons, escalator handles, door handles etc. as these accumulate all sorts of bugs

·         Boost your immune system, supplement with vitamins (zinc and Vitamin C)

·         Laugh as this changes the body physiology and is good for you

·         Educate others on basic hygiene

·         Avoid climbing on the gossip wagon

The coronavirus is a reality.  It is in the news and on our minds.  We do not have control over it, but we do have control over how we respond, emotionally.  If you are struggling with feeling stressed about this, psychological support is available.

Disclaimer:

The content of this blog is for informational purposes only. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any question you may have regarding a medical condition. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call your doctor immediately. Opt4health does not recommend or endorse any specific tests, physician, products, procedures, opinions, or other information that may be mentioned on the Opt4health blog. Reliance on any information provided by Opt4health, Opt4health employees, other contributors appearing on the blog at the invitation of Opt4health, or other visitors to the blog is solely at your own risk.

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How Stress Influences Disease

HOW STRESS INFLUENCES DISEASE: STUDY REVEALS INFLAMMATION AS THE CULPRIT

Date: April 2, 2012

Source: Carnegie Mellon University

Summary: Stress wreaks havoc on the mind and body. Until now, it has not been clear exactly how stress influences disease and health. Now researchers have found that chronic psychological stress is associated with the body losing its ability to regulate the inflammatory response. The research shows for the first time that the effects of psychological stress on the body's ability to regulate inflammation can promote the development and progression of disease.

    

FULL STORY

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Stress wreaks havoc on the mind and body. For example, psychological stress is associated with greater risk for depression, heart disease and infectious diseases. But, until now, it has not been clear exactly how stress influences disease and health.

A research team led by Carnegie Mellon University's Sheldon Cohen has found that chronic psychological stress is associated with the body losing its ability to regulate the inflammatory response. Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the research shows for the first time that the effects of psychological stress on the body's ability to regulate inflammation can promote the development and progression of disease.

"Inflammation is partly regulated by the hormone cortisol and when cortisol is not allowed to serve this function, inflammation can get out of control," said Cohen, the Robert E. Doherty Professor of Psychology within CMU's Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences.

Cohen argued that prolonged stress alters the effectiveness of cortisol to regulate the inflammatory response because it decreases tissue sensitivity to the hormone. Specifically, immune cells become insensitive to cortisol's regulatory effect. In turn, runaway inflammation is thought to promote the development and progression of many diseases.

Cohen, whose groundbreaking early work showed that people suffering from psychological stress are more susceptible to developing common colds, used the common cold as the model for testing his theory. With the common cold, symptoms are not caused by the virus -- they are instead a "side effect" of the inflammatory response that is triggered as part of the body's effort to fight infection. The greater the body's inflammatory response to the virus, the greater is the likelihood of experiencing the symptoms of a cold.

In Cohen's first study, after completing an intensive stress interview, 276 healthy adults were exposed to a virus that causes the common cold and monitored in quarantine for five days for signs of infection and illness. Here, Cohen found that experiencing a prolonged stressful event was associated with the inability of immune cells to respond to hormonal signals that normally regulate inflammation. In turn, those with the inability to regulate the inflammatory response were more likely to develop colds when exposed to the virus.

In the second study, 79 healthy participants were assessed for their ability to regulate the inflammatory response and then exposed to a cold virus and monitored for the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines, the chemical messengers that trigger inflammation. He found that those who were less able to regulate the inflammatory response as assessed before being exposed to the virus produced more of these inflammation-inducing chemical messengers when they were infected.

"The immune system's ability to regulate inflammation predicts who will develop a cold, but more importantly it provides an explanation of how stress can promote disease," Cohen said. "When under stress, cells of the immune system are unable to respond to hormonal control, and consequently, produce levels of inflammation that promote disease. Because inflammation plays a role in many diseases such as cardiovascular, asthma and autoimmune disorders, this model suggests why stress impacts them as well."

He added, "Knowing this is important for identifying which diseases may be influenced by stress and for preventing disease in chronically stressed people."

In addition to Cohen, the research team included CMU's Denise Janicki-Deverts, research psychologist; Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh's William J. Doyle; University of British Columbia's Gregory E. Miller; University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine's Bruce S. Rabin and Ellen Frank; and the University of Virginia Health Sciences Center's Ronald B. Turner.

The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, National Institute of Mental Health, National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute and the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Socioeconomic Status and Health funded this research.

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Story Source:

Materials provided by Carnegie Mellon University. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Disclaimer:

The content of this blog is for informational purposes only. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any question you may have regarding a medical condition. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call your doctor immediately. Opt4health does not recommend or endorse any specific tests, physician, products, procedures, opinions, or other information that may be mentioned on the Opt4health blog. Reliance on any information provided by Opt4health, Opt4health employees, other contributors appearing on the blog at the invitation of Opt4health, or other visitors to the blog is solely at your own risk.

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1 in 5 Employees - Risk of Burnout

1 IN 5 EMPLOYEES IS HIGHLY ENGAGED AND AT RISK OF BURNOUT

Authors: Emma Seppälä and Julia Moeller  February 02, 2018 UPDATED May 16, 2018

RECOMMENDED

Dorothea loved her new workplace and was highly motivated to perform. Her managers were delighted with her high engagement, professionalism, and dedication. She worked long hours to ensure that her staff was properly managed, that her deadlines were met, and that her team’s work was nothing short of outstanding. In the first two months, she single-handedly organized a large conference – marketing and organizing all the details of the conference and filling it to capacity. It was a remarkable feat.

In the last weeks prior to the event, however, her stress levels attained such high levels that she suffered from severe burnout symptoms, which included feeling physically and emotionally exhausted, depressed, and suffering of sleep problems. She was instructed to take time off work. She never attended the conference and needed a long recovery before she reached her earlier performance and well being levels. Her burnout symptoms had resulted from the long-term stress and the depletion of her resources over time.

Engagement means flourishing, or does it?

Employee engagement is a major concern for HR leaders. Year after year, concerned managers and researchers discuss Gallup’s shocking statistic that seven out of 10 U.S. employees report feeling un-engaged. Figuring out how to increase employee engagement has been a burning question for companies and consultants across the board.

The many positive outcomes of engagement include greater productivity and quality of work, increased safety, and employee retention. These outcomes are in fact so well established that some researchers like Arnold Bakker, Professor of Work and Organizational Psychology at the Erasmus University Rotterdam, and colleagues have linked engagement to the experience of “flourishing at work.” Similarly, Amy L. Reschly, Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Georgia, and colleagues concluded that student engagement at schools was a sign of “flourishing.”

While engagement certainly has its benefits, most of us will have noticed that, when we are highly engaged in working towards a goal we can also experience something less than positive: high levels of stress. Here’s where things get more nuanced and complicated. 

A recent study conducted by our center at Yale University, the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, in collaboration with the Faas Foundation, has cast doubts on the idea of engagement as a purely beneficial experience. This survey examined the levels of engagement and burnout in over 1,000 U.S. employees. For some people, engagement is indeed a purely positive experience; 2 out of 5 employees in our survey reported high engagement and low burnout. These employees also reported high levels of positive outcomes (such as feeling positive emotions and acquiring new skills) and low negative outcomes (such as feeling negative emotions or looking for another job). We’ll call these the optimally engaged group.

However, the data also showed that one out of five employees reported both high engagement and high burnout. We’ll call this group the engaged-exhausted group. These engaged-exhausted workers were passionate about their work, but also had intensely mixed feelings about it — reporting high levels of interest, stress, and frustration. While they showed desirable behaviours such as high skill acquisition, these apparent model employees also reported the highest turnover intentions in our sample — even higher than the un-engaged group.

That means that companies may be at risk of losing some of their most motivated and hard-working employees not for a lack of engagement, but because of their simultaneous experiences of high stress and burnout symptoms.

How to maintain high engagement without burning out in the process

While most HR efforts have stayed centered around the question of how to promote employee engagement only, we really need to start taking a more nuanced approach and ask how to promote engagement while avoiding burning out employees in the process. Here’s where key differences we found between the optimally engaged and the engaged-exhausted employees can shed some light.

Half of the optimally engaged employees reported having high resources, such as supervisor support, rewards and recognition, and self-efficacy at work, but low demands such as low workload, low cumbersome bureaucracy, and low to moderate demands on concentration and attention. In contrast, such experiences of high resources and low demands were rare (4%) among the engaged-exhausted employees, the majority of whom (64%) reported experiencing high demands and high resources.

This provides managers and supervisors with a hint as where to start supporting employees for optimal engagement. In order to promote engagement, it is crucial to provide employees with the resources they need to do their job well, feel good about their work, and recover from work stressors experienced through work.

Many HR departments, knowing employees are feeling stressed, offer wellness programs on combating stress – usually through healthy eating, exercise, or mindfulness. While we know that chronic stress is not good for employees, company wellness initiatives are not the primary way to respond to that stress. Our data suggests that while wellness initiatives can be helpful, a much bigger lever is the work itself. HR should work with front-line managers to monitor the level of demands they’re placing on people, as well as the balance between demands and resources. The higher the work demands, the higher employees’ need for support, acknowledgement, or opportunities for recovery.

What about stretch goals? Challenge, we’re told, is motivating. While that can be true, we too often forget that high challenges tend to come at high cost, and that challenging achievement situations cause not only anxiety and stress even for the most motivated individuals, but also lead to states of exhaustion. And the research on stretch goals is mixed – for a few people, chasing an ambitious goal leads to higher performance than chasing a moderate goal. For most people, though, a stretch goal leads us to become demotivated, take foolish risks, or quit.

Managers and HR leaders can help employees by dialing down the demands they’re placing on people – ensuring that employee goals are realistic and re-balancing the workloads of employees who, by virtue of being particularly skilled or productive, have been saddled with too much. They can also try to increase the resources available to employees; this includes not only material resources such as time and money, but intangible resources such as empathy and friendship in the workplace, and letting employees disengage from work when they’re not working. By avoiding emailing people after hours, setting a norm that evenings and weekends are work-free, and encouraging a regular lunch break in the middle of the day, leaders can make sure they’re sending a consistent message that balance matters.

The data is clear: engagement is key, it’s what we should strive for as leaders and employees. But what we want is smart engagement — the kind that leads to enthusiasm, motivation and productivity, without the burnout. Increased demands on employees need to be balanced with increased resources — particularly before important deadlines and during other times of stress.

 Disclaimer:

The content of this blog is for informational purposes only. The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any question you may have regarding a medical condition. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call your doctor immediately. Opt4health does not recommend or endorse any specific tests, physician, products, procedures, opinions, or other information that may be mentioned on the Opt4health blog. Reliance on any information provided by Opt4health, Opt4health employees, other contributors appearing on the blog at the invitation of Opt4health, or other visitors to the blog is solely at your own risk.

Opt4health:

Contact: +27823716364                                                

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