Eating for your health

I have been following a Malaysian cardiologist's blog who religiously write about current updates in cardiology. I have to admit that I like him (?her, I don't know) because he really believes that lifestyle changes (dietary, stress management and exercises) are the most important thing in preventing (and reversing) heart disease (and he frequently give updates on researches in this area).

He recently wrote about stable and unstable plaque in the arteries of the heart. When the blood supply to the heart is blocked, the blockage can be stable or unstable. A stable blockage (plaque) reduce blood supply to your heart, so you have heart disease, but you can live with it. An unstable one is the one that can suddenly rupture, so the body respond to it by trying to heal it the rupture, but this will cause blood clot in the vessel. So that particular area your heart will suddenly be totally deprived of blood supply- and this is what we call a 'heart attack', which are described by people who were lucky enough to survive it, as severe crushing chest pain, with the feeling of impending doom.

He wrote that recently some researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, Manhattan have found a way to detect which plaque is unstable, although they only have done it in mice (which means a good 10 years away from the technique to be passed to be used in humans). They used multi-coloured CT scan. (what a scary thing to know that you have an unstable plaque! almost like a death sentence)

Now come the purpose of me writing this entry.

The popular belief is that when you have high cholesterol you can block your heart. This is true but the blockage/plaque has to be inflamed for it to be vulnerable to give you a heart attack. (for readers who does not understand what inflamed means, you can imagine it similar to 'ínjured'). So this multi-coloured CT detects the cells or agents involved in the process of inflammation (the macrophages). And the 'coloured macrophages' will show on the images of the heart, the denser the colour the more macrophages, meaning the more inflammation and therefore the more vulnerable the plaque.

I actually want to write about the inflammation thing. When I was reading about the role of 'nutraceuticals' (medicinal properties in foods) in cancer, I came across the theory that inflammation is the key process that LEADS to diseases (not the RESULT of diseases). Inflammation gives you an unstable plaque in your heart. It also makes your supposedly benign growth spread (therefore becomes cancerous). And it is the underlying process in various types of arthritis and Alzheimer's. There are many evidence to this but I won't go into them now. So scientists now believe that if we control the inflammation in our body, we can live longer and avoid major diseases.

Interestingly, there are foods that have anti-inflammatory properties. This is proven by lab studies and also the measurement of inflammatory markers in people who consume more of these types of foods. Similarly, there are foods that are pro-inflammatory. Hence the advice is to eat more anti-inflammatory foods and avoid the pro- ones. InsyaAllah your body can heal itself and stay healthy till your expiry date. How comforting! :) This gives you a sense of control in your health.

I will be concise and just list the foods here. You can get into search engines of journals to really know what the food molecules do at cellular level if you need more evidence to strengthen your belief. (You need to belief first before you can do lifestyle changes because it does take great effort to refrain yourself from the foods).

Anti-inflammatory Foods (the ones that you should consume more)

1. Green Tea- contains EGCG, most powerful nutritional molecule against inflammation, which is present in all tea leaves but destroyed during fermentation of black tea-our usual tea-to get this EGCG you have to drink unfermented tea ie green tea.

2. Turmeric -the magic ingredient only present in Asian cuisine- might explain why India has low incidence of cancer compared to the West despite the people having worse exposure to environmental carcinogens.

3. Berries (blueberry, strawberry, raspberry)-contains ellagic acid, which does not only counter inflammation but also detoxify cells (about detoxifying cells I will write in another entry, another important step to protect yourself from diseases).

4. Walnuts, pecans and hazelnuts-also contain ellagic acid like the berries (and these nuts also have high omega-3 levels which is important for immune function, another topic that I will deal with later, insyaAllah)

5. Parsley and celery- contains apigenine, also a strong anti-inflammatory. Don't hesitate to dump this whole bunch in your soups.

6. Ginger roots-other than anti-inflammatory, it is also an anti-oxidant and has been one of the oldest medicine on earth (not just in Malay tradition, but also in Ayurvedic and ancient Chinese).

(there are probably many more tropical veges or fruits that are anti-inflammatory but has not been discovered yet).

Pro-inflammatory Foods (should avoid or limit consumption)

1. Red meats (beef, mutton etc)-especially if the livestocks were fed grains, not grass. And especially cured or processed ones eg sausages and burgers (aarrghh..I know)

2. Sugar- not only it causes you diabetes (that's another whole different story, although somewhat related), the sugar itself is pro-inflammatory (ie let's say sugar does not cause diabetes, the sugar itself is a poison). Please note that there are other names for 'sugar' used by manufacturers- maltose, corn syrup, golden syrup, dextrose, fructose. Try not to take sugar in your drinks, or just drink plain water, because unless you are a cake / biscuits maker, you would not realize how much hidden sugar there are in our daily food.

3. Oil -choose your oil wisely, all oils are pro-inflammatory but some have lower inflammatory effects eg olive oil, linseed, flaxseed or rapeseed oil. Olive oil even have extra benefits, that is it contains polyphenols for your immune system. I think this oil subject is very important because almost everything we cook contains oil, and as sugar, there are many 'hidden oil' eg in cakes, breads, biscuits.

4. Trans Fats (or partially hydrogenated oil / vegetable shortening)- this is the reason we should be careful with processed industrialized foods (ie non-fresh foods). A lot of them contains trans fats, a type of oil that has been transformed to make foods have longer shelf life, and better 'mouth-feel'. It is also cheaper, so it is used by many manufacturers. Denmark and Switzerland have totally banned trans fats from their industry, and recently in January 2010 so did California. Here is a very good website to load you with all trans fats information (they even sued Kraft for putting trans fats in Oreo). It is comforting to know that Tesco has removed all trans fats from their own brand products.

5. Excessive alcohol- no explanation needed. All medical practitioners know this.

6. Artificial food additives eg MSG and artificial sweeteners (aspartame)- beware of 'hidden' MSG and aspartame too eg in ready made sauces, diet cola etc.

There are others. I have listed those above because they are very highly consumed and probably most damaging.


Now, come to think of it, the traditional practice of 'pantang larang' (forbidden foods) by our good ancestors have some basis after all. Post natal mothers for example, have to avoid oil, red meats, ice, also ciku, pineapple and coconut juice (some strict ones say must avoid pineapples for one whole year and worse I've heard is to avoid coconut juice for the whole reproductive years). These foods are probably pro-inflammatory, especially to the female reproductive organs. Although we think that a balanced diet is best but at certain times in our life there are foods that we must avoid altogether. This is to help our body fight the disease and heal itself. Also thanks to the wisdom and creativity of our ancestors incorporating medicinal spices into our daily foods.

And what about 'pantang' by Allah swt ie pork, alcohol, unslaughtered animals, blood, food obtained from unlawful income etc? Surely Allah, the Creator of  every creases in our bodies, the Owner of All Knowledge knows best.