Garlic has been used for centuries as a medicinal herb, but it is only relatively recently that scientists have cracked the mystery of why garlic can help keep your heart healthy.
It’s all down to the allicin content!
It’s the allicin that’s broken down into the slightly sulphur smelling compounds. These compounds react with red blood cells and produce hydrogen sulphide which relaxes the blood vessels, and keeps blood flowing easily. Hydrogen sulphide also plays a vital role in helping cells communicate with each other, and within the blood vessels it stimulates the cells that form the lining to relax. This has the effect of allowing the vessels to dilate, which in turn reduces blood pressure, therefore allowing the blood to carry more oxygen to vital organs and so reducing pressure on the heart.
In a variety of studies this tension in the vessels reduced by as much as 72%.
Lead researcher Dr David Kraus said ‘Our results suggest that garlic is a very good thing’, and ‘certainly in areas where consumption is high, such as the Mediterranean and the Far East, there is a significantly lower incidence of cardiovascular disease’.
So, this is all good news for those of us wishing to keep our hearts in tip-top condition, add to this the amazing benefits of taking garlic at this time of year to help fight off colds and you got one great product. So why not take a look at our excellent value Odourless Garlic products.
Please do bear in mind that garlic is powerful and may interact with blood thinning drugs, so if you are on these always consult your doctor.
For about the last year, Probiotics, or so called ‘Friendly Bacteria’ have been the subject of many discussions. How do the yoghurt type drinks work with so much sugar in them? How can the even billions of bacteria products, have any effect on the already trillions of bacteria present in the guts? and so on!
They Really Do Work!
Well, dieticians at Imperial College London, have shown that they do work (still not sure about the amount of sugar in some of the drinks!). Dr Jeremy Nicholson says “We have established that introducing ‘friendly’ bacteria can change the dynamics of the whole population of microbes in the gut”. The screening of blood, urine, faeces and livers, revealed that levels of several key chemicals related to important processes in the body were altered in those who were probiotic-treated. One of the ways the probiotics helped was in the breakdown of bile acids in the gut, therefore allowing more fat to pass undigested through the body, rather than being absorbed. This may well have a significant effect on cholesterol and body weight.
A spokeswomen for the British Dietetic Association said that there were too few studies of probiotics to actually show real benefits, but our understanding of how they work is changing and this should benefit everyone.
Probiotic Performance!
Australian research has found that Probiotic supplements can reduce the number and length of infections suffered by athletes. Strenuous training can affect the immune system and make athletes both amateur and professional vulnerable to coughs and colds.
The British Journal of Sports Medicine study found that taking probiotics more than halved the number of days the athletes had symptoms. Although it is not entirely known why, it is becoming increasingly evident that the ‘friendly bacteria’ have an effect on the immune system.
A small study conducted at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra, focused on 20 top-level endurance runners during their intensive winter training programme. Over the four months, all 20 received 2 two month long course of pills - the first containing Lactobacillus, and the second containing no active ingredients. All the athletes then recorded any days they were suffering from symptoms such as coughs and runny noses. The total toll of illness across the group was then recorded, finding a total of 72 days of illness when the dummy pills were taken, as opposed to 30 days when the probiotics were being taken. Suggesting that the probiotics might somehow help the body protect itself.
Critical Protection!
A recent Swedish study concluded that probiotics may inhibit the colonisation of airways by dangerous bugs, performing just as well as normal antiseptics, in the prevention of pneumonia, and being more natural could also pose fewer side-effects. Although they did admit that much larger studies are required.
So there we are, three very good reasons to consider the use of probiotic products like Lactobacillus Acidophilus and Acidophilus with Oatbran.
Source: Various articles BBC News
Even though the Bio Nutrition website and blog were only launched a few weeks ago, we’re always looking for ways that we can improve the online experience for our customers and blog readers. That’s why you’ll notice a number of design changes that have been introduced in the last couple of days.
On this blog, we’ve moved to a less cluttered theme that we hope is easier to use, and makes the posts easier to read. And on the main website, we’ve softened some of the colours we’ve used and re-vamped the header, to again hopefully make the site easier to read and nicer to use.
As always, we welcome your feedback - let us know (either in the comments or by emailing us) what you think of the changes we’ve made and whether there is anything that you think we need to pay some attention to. After all, the site is for you, so we want you to be happy using it.
Back in September, we told you about the latest study into the importance of vitamin B12 for health as we get older (click here for the previous post). At the same time, we introduced a special offer to make an already excellent value product even more appealing.
Well, that offer ran out at the beginning of the month but we’ve had so much interest in the product that we’re bringing the offer back. Until mid-November, you can buy 90 tablets of 100µg Vitamin B12 for just £2.95. That’s a three month supply for just over 3p per day.
To take advantage of this great offer, visit our main site by clicking this link.
For those of you that have read our Green Policy you will have noticed that for the past few weeks we’ve been in the process of signing up for ‘1% For The Planet‘.
Well, finally that’s all now finished. We can display their logos and also help promote the movement!
We’re proud to be a member of the 1% For The Planet movement, which is a scheme set up to bring much needed funding to environmental projects all around the world. Every member company commits to contributing 1% of their annual turnover to the scheme. 1% may not sound like a lot, but because it’s based on turnover not profit there’s a much bigger fund to start with. For instance, a company that turns over £1 million may only make £75,000 profit; if they paid 1% of profit, they’d contribute £750 - but 1% of turnover means a contribution of £10,000!
It also means that when you place an order with us, you know exactly how much we’ll be giving to 1% For The Planet! And the scheme is fully audited and closely scrutinised so you can be sure that whenever you see the 1% For The Planet logo, 1% of the company’s turnover is going directly to help environmental projects in the UK and all over the planet.
For the first few years at least we’ve decided to make our donations to UK based schemes, but after that we are open to suggestions.
So if you have a local environmental charity we could help by making donations to, let us know. Please take into account that they must be recognised by the 1% For The Planet organisation and be registered with them. If our experience is anything to go by this is a relatively easy and painless process and could be well worth their while!
So why not help the planet and keep yourself fit and healthy?
Reports in today’s media are highlighting research that shows just how important vitamin B12 is to long term health.
A study, by Oxford University and published in Neurology, indicates that older people with lower levels of this essential nutrient are more six times more likely to suffer brain shrinkage, and thereby have problems with memory loss. Other studies have indicated that 20% of people are deficient in vitamin B12.
The main dietary sources of vitamin B12 are meat, fish and milk and this creates problems for anyone who is following an ethical diet, such as vegans and vegetarians. There are no good plant-based sources available. But with this new research highlighting this area of concern, everyone should be ensuring they’re getting a good daily intake and, if you’re not getting it from your diet, then you need to take a supplement.
Bio Nutrition offers Vitamin B12 100µg at only £3.95 for 90 tablets and for a limited time, you can save an extra £1 - that’s only £2.95 for 90 tablets!
Click this link to check out the product on the main website.
As you can see on the right hand side of our main blog page, Bio Nutrition now have a variety of ways you can keep yourself up to date with our latest news and information. You can follow us on either Twitter, Friendfeed, Facebook or by subscribing to our RSS Feed, or all four if you really want to!
We’ve done this to help make your Bio Nutrition experience as easy as possible; why not tell your friends about us too so they can be kept informed of important new releases and special offers.
And look out soon for our new Mini Ads, featuring Nobby and his friends & family!
At last, the greatly anticipated and much requested Bio Nutrition website went live for the first time on 1 July 2008!
The website (which can found at www.bionutrition.co.uk) is a full ecommerce web solution that showcases all of the products currently available from Bio Nutrition Health Products Ltd, with more being added all the time. You can browse through the product categories (helpfully grouped into health issues such as Bone & Joint Health, Detox & Anti-Ageing, etc), or use the powerful search function to find the products that you want.
Each product page gives full details of the formulation, as well as helpful information about the major ingredients and the health uses that they are put to. You can check out the current bestsellers, and also take a look at what products other customers have been buying.
In tandem with launching the website, we’ve also updated the packaging of the products to make them much more appealing – and the new pots that we’ve introduced are far easier to open, and more resilient when being sent through the postal system.
Please take a look at the site and let me know what you think – it’s early days and while we’ve worked hard on the look, feel and functionality of the site I’m sure that not everything is 100% right yet. If there’s something that you think is missing (or if you find an error or a bug anywhere), please let me know so that I can continue to develop the site and make it as good as it can be.
