Protein and Bone Loss

blogger-image--358023153I’ve recapped 3 studies that I read recently related to protein and bone density. They are showing animal protein is associated with less bone loss. These conclusions were based on studies that asked people what they ate (not the ideal form) and seeing how many people broke hips, or who had bone density measurements done.  Instead of popping calcium pills, we may be better off popping protein pills (just kidding!).  Just eat your turkey breast, salmon, sardines, eggs, and pork loin and liver. Along with your veggies, of course!

Milk has a strangle hold on the strong bones campaign. You don’t have to believe the hype though. They just have really good marketing. Real science is starting to shed light on the facts.

The first study goes as far to say that “the risk of hip fracture was not related to intake of calium or Vitamin D, but was negatively associated with total protein intake.” Meaning the more protein, the less risk of hip fracture.

The second study specified that “for every 15g/day increase in animal protein, bone mineral density increased,” and continues on to point out “a negative association between vegetable protein and bone mineral density was observed.”

Lastly, the third study states that “lower protein intake was significantly related to bone loss,” and “higher intake of animal protein does not appear to affect the skeleton adversely” since they were studying the idea of whether or not excess protein “may be associated with negative calcium balance.”

Recap:
Study 1 says more protein is associated with less hip fractures.
Study 2 says more animal protein is associated with better bone mineral density and more vegetable protein wasassociated  with lower bone density.
Study 3 says less animal protein was related to significant bone loss and doesn’t effect calcium balance.

Maybe the milk people will switch gears and tell us it’s the whey protein in milk that really helps bones. I could almost get behind that idea. Almost.

For the nerds like me out there who like to read the studies themselves, here you go:

  1. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9925137
  2. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11914191
  3. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11127216

Fish Oil and Prostate Cancer

I just wanted to link to a post by Examine.com that talks about fish oil and prostate cancer. There’s been a bit of news claiming fish oil my raise prostate cancer risk.

What the traditional news feeds fail to talk about is how men who have been diagnosed with prostate cancer are usually instructed to take a supplemental fish oil. Examine does a good job of sorting this confusion out and explaining why the traditional media sources are jumping to conclusions they shouldn’t be.

Don’t be afraid of eating good quality fish a few times a week.

Fructose and Liver Damage Study. Reviewed.

blogger-image-1298527871As I read the summary of a study today, I couldn’t help but be a little discouraged. The title “Dietary Fructose Causes Liver Damage in Animal Model” sounds like it’d be right up my alley. It sounds great at first, as the study tries to isolate the effect of fructose from a previous study. The first study had one group of monkeys eat all they wanted with fructose added, and another group had a limited amount of food. (1) The article from today is a follow up study questioning if the liver disease that was seen in the “all you can eat” monkey group from study 1 was caused by the extra food intake, leading to obesity, or if fructose was the main cause.  So in this second study (summarized here), two groups of monkeys were fed the same amount of calories to keep weight the same, but one group had 24% fructose while the other had 0.5% fructose.

They had good intentions, but when describing the two groups’ food intake, things start to fall apart.  The study says “both diets had the same amount of fat, carbohydrate and protein, but the sources were different… The high-fructose group’s diet was made from flour, butter, pork fat, eggs and fructose…, similar to what many people eat, while the control group’s diet was made from healthy complex carbohydrates and soy protein.” This statement implies an inherent bias that butter, pork fat and eggs are bad, and grouping these food items with fructose exacerbates the feelings (and that’s mostly what they are, emotions, not science) of fear about fat and animal products. It also less subtly highlights “complex carbohydrates and soy protein” as healthy alternatives. It appears to me that they tried to give the fructose group an unhealthy diet and the other group a healthy diet. In doing so, they failed to isolate the fructose as the lone variable of the study.

The fructose group that was given eggs, butter, and pork fat (all good things in my mind) along with flour (not so good) went on to develop liver disease and the other group that was given “healthy complex carbs and soy protein” fared much better even at the same weight. There are lots of questions not mentioned in the study which are important in my mind.  Here’s a few:

  • What did the complex carbs consist of? Brown rice, wheat bran, milled corn, oats, bamboo shoots? This makes a difference.
  • Was the soy protein a highly processed isolate which damages fats and proteins, or was the soy fermented to make tempeh (I’m doubtful)?
  • What was the quality of the butter, pork fat, and eggs?
  • How much flour was given to the fructose group?

What they propose is that the two groups had the same macronutrient ratio and same calories and therefore, essentially an equal diet, but I would argue that that is not true. Fat is not just fat. Fats from different sources contain different micronutrients, different vitamins, different ratios of omega fatty acids, different oxidation rates, and so on. I think a better substitution would’ve been to replace the fructose with glucose in the non-fructose group, and have both groups eat the same amount of butter, pork fat and eggs. Different carbs have different nutrients as well, but replacing one sugar for another would be a better and easier substitute than soy and complex carbs.

The interesting thing to me about the article was that the bacterial escape from the intestine was the major cause of liver damage. The fructose wasn’t the actual damaging factor to the liver. It appears that the higher the intestinal permeability, the worse the liver fared. So why did the fructose group have higher permeability? Was it the gluten in the flour, or was it the fructose or maybe even the eggs? These aren’t normal dietary foods for monkeys and any one of them could have caused an auto-immune reaction leading to the gut permeability, or perhaps the monkey intestines are not used to dealing with the particular anti-nutrients these foods have. You could argue that monkey intestines are more suited to something akin to complex carbs and soy for food which would’ve prevented the same degree of gut permeability.

 

The title of this study highlights a focus on the effects of fructose but fails to isolate fructose among other controls. The flawed structure of this study doesn’t clear up any long standing myths or bring to light whether fructose is good or bad, but I thought I’d share my thought process as I read through the article to help you view studies through a different lens.

As always, post any comments or questions you might have in the comments section. Thanks for reading!

Ketosis vs Ketoacidosis

This article provides a brief discussion on the subject of ketosis and related metabolic processes. To begin, let’s define some terms:

Ketone
– an organic compound with a carbonyl group attached to two carbon atoms. This compound can be used in the Krebs cycle to produce energy. Here I’ll use the term to identify an alternate energy source to glucose.

Ketosis– a condition in which the body is producing ketones to fuel the body.

Ketoacidosis– when the body’s blood pH is too acidic because of excess ketones which can lead to coma or even death, if not treated.

Ketogenesis– the creation of ketones by the body due to a lack of glucose.

Ketogenic diet– a way of eating that induces ketogenisis, usually by reducing carbohydrate intake.

steak_fat

Ketosis is often confused with Ketoacidosis. The difference between these two terms is the quantity. Ketosis is a condition when you have a small amount of ketones floating around in your blood (0.5-3.0 mM) helping fuel your body. Ketoacidosis is when there are too many ketones (15-25 mM) causing your blood pH to get dangerously acidic. Low-carb diets are sometimes criticized for inducing ketosis for fear of ketoacidosis, and in turn harming your kidneys. WebMD says “Consuming too much protein puts a strain on the kidneys, which can make a person susceptible to kidney disease,”(1) when talking about ketosis. A low-carb diet doesn’t mean high protein. It is often the case, but it’s not necessary. You might wonder how the body regulates the amount of ketones. You might also be concerned that being in a state of ketosis would lead to ketoacidosis if a low-carb diet were continued for a long period of time.

The truth is that the body only goes into ketoacidosis (the harmful condition) if there’s a problem with insulin. When the body doesn’t produce insulin (type 1 diabetes or late stage type 2 diabetes), the cells keep asking for energy. When the body is not getting enough energy from glucose (since insulin is the key that allows glucose into the cell), it starts making ketones for energy. Since insulin also inhibits ketogenesis, a lack of insulin can result in ketoacidosis because there’s nothing to tell the body to stop making ketones.  The system is broken which results in ketone abundance, but the ketones didn’t break the system.

A study in 2004 was conducted with 89 obese (BMI >35) individuals who were put on a ketogenic diet for 6 months (2). Eating a normal amount of protein and a high percentage of fat, they lost weight and improved their lab numbers. Their cholesterol numbers improved and “the level of blood glucose significantly decreased. The changes in the level of urea and creatinine were not statistically significant. This means there was no increase in acid in the blood and the kidneys did not seem to be in any kind of distress.

Ketosis can be induced by eating a low-carb diet. Whether it incorporates high fat or high protein low-carb doesn’t make much difference.  Ketones will be created from fat and protein to fuel the body, and are actually up to 25% more efficient (3) in the heart muscle. When a healthy individual with the correct amount of insulin in his or her body consumes a low-carb diet, the insulin regulates ketone production, keeping ketoacidosis in check. If you are healthy and don’t have insulin issues, there’s no danger of ketoacidosis.

 

Have some questions? Post them below in the comments section.

 

(1) http://www.webmd.com/diet/high-protein-low-carbohydrate-diets

(2) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2716748/

(3) http://www.jbc.org/content/285/34/25950.abstract

Intermittent Fasting

homer-asleepThinking about intermittent fasting? It might help Type 2 Diabetes and Cardiovascular Disease, but let’s discuss how and why.

Intermittent fasting (IF) has been gaining popularity in the last few years. Based on this study, it seems to help folks with diabetes (DMII) and cardiovascular disease (CVD). The question is, does it help with DMII and CVD because of the weight loss, or because of improved hormonal response and reduced inflammation? The answer is it probably doesn’t matter. Most of the time, when people start an IF protocol, they reduce calories and eat healthier. By eating healthier, we reduce the empty calories, reduce the sugar, and reduce unhealthy oils, thereby reducing inflammation and increasing nutrients. You could do all these same things by just eating healthier, and then you don’t have to go hungry.

Is there a place for IF? Absolutely. Once you’ve got your healthy diet squared away, your exercise regimented, and your sleep dialed in, introducing IF may improve performance and get you to that next level. And it can be done in as little as 18 hrs, which really just means skipping breakfast. Dinner at 6pm, and lunch the next day at 12pm will give the hormetic stress your body needs to initiate the benefits of fasting. Would I recommend treating Type 2 Diabetes (DMII) with IF. Not until long after the big 3 have been dealt with (diet, exercise, and sleep).

You might ask why this looks like it’s helping. I’d venture to say that on average, the carbohydrate intake with people IF is lowered. And as part of a study, people would be recommended to eat more healthfully. More veggies, nuts, seeds, along with fruits and increased fiber are going to improve most people’s diets which will help DMII. The correlation between IF and improved DMII and CVD could be a result from reducing calories and therefore losing weight, or just improving the calories that are consumed. Don’t get caught in the hype. Someone who’s metabolically deranged will see improvements, but it’s adding another stress and may be detrimental if done for a long time without dealing with the other stressors.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130426115456.htm

http://dvd.sagepub.com/content/13/2/68.full

Studies for Medications aren’t the Full Story

First, my apologies for neglecting you and the site for too long.

I’ve been busy with school projects, studying, and a big conference. Along with full time work, prepping to move, slowly attempting to revamp the site and a mini weekend vacation, there’s not as much time to look for and write about interesting (at least I hope you find them interesting) articles. This semester will finish up in a few weeks and I hope to use the short break between spring and summer semesters to work on the second part of “The Artery Clogging Myth” which has been set aside for far too long.

I have a few recipes in the lineup that I’ll post as soon as I get some pictures of the dishes, and a school paper I’ll share with you about how beetroot juice may help athletic performance.

For now, here’s a TED talk about the tests and studies on medications, and why we can’t get the whole story. Thanks Tyler.

What Doctor’s Don’t Know About the Drugs They Prescribe

Milk, Milk, Milk…

milkIf your kids drink cow’s milk, you might want to stick to the full fat version. This new study shows children drinking low-fat milk tend to be heavier.

Another study shows women who “consume high-fat dairy products following breast cancer diagnosis increase their chances of dying from the disease years later.”

So you might think, I’ll just avoid the whole low-fat/high-fat issue and skip the dairy. But then this study says college kids who don’t drink the recommended three servings of dairy per day, are more likely to have metabolic disorder, which is defined as a person with three of the following: abdominal obesity, high blood pressure, high blood sugar and unhealthy cholesterol and lipid levels.

All of these articles have recently been in the news and freely accessible to anybody who searches for anything related to milk, cancer, metabolic disorder, or childhood obesity.

We have three reports; one says drink whole milk (as a child for proper weight), another than says high-fat dairy causes increased mortality in breast cancer patients, and a third that says if you don’t drink your milk, you’re more likely to have 3 of several serious risk factors to poor health. It might be easy over simplify it to this: low-fat dairy cause’s obesity, high-fat dairy cause’s cancer, and you definitely need to drink your milk. So which milk would you choose after reading these three studies?

Let’s break it down a little bit. In the first study, the children who drank whole milk tended to be less hungry after consuming the higher calorie milk and therefore apparently ate less snacks. Getting real calories from a decent quality food source full of its original vitamins and minerals is definitely going to lead to a healthier body weight.

The second study delves a little into why high-fat dairy could be the cause of cancer, with its estrogenic and growth hormones. Milk naturally has growth hormones because it’s supposed to help calves grow. Imagine that! This study had a decent sample size (1,893 women at the start) and followed them for 6-12 years. But there’s no information on how well women who didn’t consume any dairy, or how they fared. It was also based on a food questionnaire which have a history of not being very accurate. Some of the patients could have fudged the numbers, or they may just forget how much high-fat dairy they ate. Do you remember what you ate last Tuesday?

The study about increased incidence of metabolic disorder is pretty poorly done. They took a small sample of a homogenous population who has a higher frequency of poor lipid profiles and obesity, isolated the fact that they don’t consume a lot of dairy, and made a conclusion for the masses. Milk isn’t a big part of Mexican culture, some have a genetic predisposition to poor lipid profiles and obesity, and college kids tend to drink more soda and sugar sweetened beverages. It’s pretty easy to blame their metabolic syndrome on a lack of milk. Or anything else you might replace milk with, like: lack of exercise, lack of vegetables, increased stress from college and leaving their home country, poor food choices from a school cafeteria, or a host of other factors.

If you tolerate milk without developing acne or getting gas and bloating, drink some milk. I’d recommend getting milk as unprocessed as you can. Straight from the cow would be ideal, but if you can find organic, grass fed, full fat milk in the store that’d be good too. It’s a good source of calories, Vit D, calcium, and goes great in some coffee or tea. Avoid the ultra-homogenized, uber-pasterized fat free stuff as it’s practically white water and not worth your time. Don’t be afraid of dairy, but it should be more of a treat or supplemental calorie source, and not the backbone of your diet.

The Best Five Exercises for the Desk Jockey

If you were stranded on a desert island and could only do 5 exercises…. well that’s just silly. If you were stranded on a desert island, you’d have to do all kinds of activity to build yourself shelter, make clothing, hunt for sustenance and protect yourself. You’d get all the “exercise” you needed from real movement and daily activities.

Let’s talk about something more of us can relate to. If you were stranded in an office for 40 hours a week, had numerous other obligations that required lots of sitting and reduced your exercise time, what 5 exercises would you do? You would want to incorporate some of the basic movements your body is supposed to do. Push, pull, bend, squat, and lunge. There are plenty of other movements you’d likely do if you had more time, but we’re looking for the best bang-for-the-buck, time wise.

Pushing may be the easiest to incorporate. Find a small space and do a few pushups. Done! Pushups will work your chest, and triceps; a couple major muscles incorporated when pushing. Pushups will also activate your core (abs, obliques, and lower back) to keep your butt from sinking when you’re in proper position. If you can’t do a standard pushup, try it from your knees instead of your feet. If you can’t do knee pushups, try some wall pushups. Keep your back straight, and your elbows close to your body.

pushup1 pushup

If you’re able, pull-ups and chin-ups are a great way to work a lot of your pulling muscle. All the major back muscles are used, as well as the biceps and shoulders.

pullup1 pullup2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Since many people cannot do a pull-up, here are some other options: Lat pull down, upright row, seated row. These exercises do end up isolating slightly different muscles, but all of them work your biceps, lats, and upper back to some degree.

standingrow1 standingrow2

While you might be able to find a heavy bar to lift, it seems like a lot of those exercises require a gym, or some kind of weights, right?. If you don’t have time between meetings or coffee breaks to use your office gym (if you even have one), take your belt, a strap, or a rope and wrap it around a pole or another sturdy structure about chest high and do this variation of the seated row. Place your feet at the base of the pole and lean back, grabbing the belt for support. When the belt is taut and your arms are straight, you’re in the starting position. Keeping your feet still, pull yourself towards the pole with with your arms, bringing your chest closer to the pole as you squeeze your shoulder blades together.

beltpull1 beltpull2 beltpull3

Bending is a necessary daily activity. You might have to tie your shoes, pick something up off the floor, or even (gasp!) lift a box. We’re told to “lift with your legs” which involves squatting (and will be our next movement), so that we don’t injure our backs. That’s a smart move if you have a weak lower back, like most of us. But what if we wanted to concentrate on strengthening our backs to prevent injury? Instead of the “don’t use it because you’ll hurt it” mentality, think of the “use it or lose it” mantra.

When starting out, begin by stretching out your hamstrings and gluts and warming up before trying to strengthen your lower back. Reaching for your toes while keeping your lower back straight will warm up your lower back muscles while stretching your hamstrings. Concentrate on pivoting at the hips without rounding your back. This will stretch those muscles so when they are used, they won’t be so tight they cause an injury.

toetouch1

A great way to strengthen your lower back is to do “back extensions.” These can be done in the same place as the pushups. Lie down, stomach on the floor and lift your head and upper torso as much as comfortable, using your lower back to lift. Put your arms out to your sides and imagine you are an airplane. Point your thumbs up towards the sky and squeeze your shoulder blades together. Keep your toes on the floor when starting out and slowly progress to lifting your toes and activating your glutes.  Lift and hold for a count of two. That’s one repetition.
airplaine

Squatting can be a big help when the time comes to lift something heavier. Your lower back muscles are very small in comparison to your glutes, quads and hamstring muscles which will activate when you squat properly. I posted about why and how to squat a little while ago. Most people will tell you squatting so far down that your butt is lower than your knees is a good way to cause knee injury. Again, “use it or lose it”. If your muscles aren’t trained to do something, you’re more likely to hurt those muscles if they are called in to action. If we train our muscles and joints to move through their full range of motion, we’ll actually be able to do so.

You can start out by squatting down onto a coffee table or other short furniture. A lowered desk chair would work just fine. Slowly lower yourself, keeping your back straight on the bench or chair keeping your balance by sticking your butt back and pivoting at the hips and bending your knees. Push through your heels (think about lifting your toes to focus on pushing through the heels) to stand back up. Once the bench is easy, you can progress into a full squat.

761d2-squat3 squat1

Our last exercise is the lunge. You might be wondering why lunging is in the 5 exercises since it seems like we don’t do this motion very regularly. Lunging works a lot of important muscles, stretches others, and helps improve your balance all at the same time. They also don’t require a lot of space, or any extra equipment. Just find a spot where you can take a really big step forward.  Not only is this a good glute and quad workout, but you’ll get a nice stretch through your hip flexors on the back leg, which will be a good change from being seated.

lunge1 lunge2

Step forward and keep your front knee over your front foot, preventing the knee from going past the toes. Keep your back toes pointed forward and sink your hips down until your hips are at the same height as your knee and you form a 90 degree angle in your knee. Push back off your front heel to return to the starting position and then step forward with the other foot and push back in the same manner. That’s one repetition. I like to keep the back foot farther back to stretch the hip flexor. If the hip flexor stretch is too uncomfortable, take a smaller step and let the back knee go straight down instead of slightly back.

If you do 10 repetitions of each exercise, and did 3 sets in a circuit (one exercise after the other, then going back to the first exercise), it probably won’t take you more than 10 minutes. Doing this twice a day will get you blood moving and keep your joints lubricated. Next time we’ll get into how to create a “home gym” on the cheap.

Are there any other exercises you love? Post your time crunched exercise ideas in the comments!

Skin Deep and Skin Care

The Skin Deep website has a list of essentially all the personal hygiene products you might use, and rates them based on ingredients. You may not want to know what’s in your soap or your deodorant, but if you do, this site has all the details. It has moisturizers, soaps, deodorants, sunscreen, toothpaste, shampoo, and almost anything else you use in the bathroom. I thought it was easiest to search for a specific product. If you want to browse through a list of items, it can get a bit tedious since there are so many. The site is a little tough to use, but if you find your product, it gives you a lot of information about it (usually). While they do have some links to Amazon or other places you might find it online, it’d be nice if you could filter things by price or availability so you could find “good” product close by without paying a fortune. More pictures would also be helpful. Their rating system is easy to follow and color coded. 0-2 is good (green), 3-6 is less good (yellow), and 7-10 is bad (red). The score is supported by research and they tell you if any has been done, ranging from none to very thorough.
I’ve been using Dr. Bronner’s 18-in-1 liquid soap for a couple years now and have been happy with it. I use it as shampoo, body soap, and shaving cream. In a pinch (or camping) you can use it as toothpaste and laundry soap or dish washing soap. Personally, I’m a fan of the Almond scent as the Peppermint one was a little too tingly for me in the morning.

As far as deodorant is concerned, I’ve taken a liking to the Thai Deodorant Stone. For me, it seems to work better than either of the “natural” deodorant sticks (Tom’s, Jason’s) I’ve tried, and it has less chemicals and ingredients. It’s basically a salt stick which inhibits bacterial growth which causes odor. You can use it on your feet too if you have foot odor problems. I recently heard of Primal Pit Paste and would be interested to try it out if I get a chance.

I used coconut oil as lotion for a little while, and then got sucked back into the standard moisturizers because of price, and convenience, but I have been looking for a good replacement to the regular grocery store lotions. Dr. Bronner’s makes a coconut based lotion, but it’s pretty watery, absorbs (or dries) really quickly (too quickly in my opinion), and is a lot more expensive than other brands. I will try EO Everyone Lotion here in the near future and see how it is. It’s a bigger bottle and not too expensive so I hope I’ll like it, since it’d be a good alternative to the store brand lotions.

What do you use for skin care? Do you read the ingredients, like you do with food? Let us know how you stay clean and healthy!

Cavemen Had Better Teeth Than We Do

iii_d_115
credit to NIH for the picture.

This is an article NPR picked up from Nature Genetics. After scientists looked at the skulls from cavemen, they’ve concluded that they had pretty good teeth. So much so that it appears they didn’t have the oral hygiene issues that we have today. Even with our toothpaste, floss, mouth wash and fluoride filled water. Eating more meat, nuts and vegetables seems to keep our teeth cleaner, and the proper bacteria in our mouths.

After the introduction of grains and sugar, the bad bacteria had a good source of nutrients which caused us to get cavities. We all know sugar is bad for our teeth, and we brush our teeth twice daily and floss, but those bad bacteria have roughly 12 hrs between brushings to grow and make pretty little holes in our enamel.

The idea is similar to that of the proper balance of bacteria in our digestive tract. The proper bacteria are healthy, and an imbalance towards too many “bad” bacteria may be one of the causes of our increase in chronic diseases. Most people don’t think of cavities as a disease, but it does seem to prove that there is an imbalance of bacteria in our mouths.

What did you eat since the last time you brushed your teeth? Think the bacteria like it as much as you did?