Archives for June 2017

June 29, 2017 By Trupti Hingad 10 Comments

Urine Colour – Can be a good indicator of health

In my previous blog, I discussed how your poop describes your health status. In this blog, I shall tell you how your Pee says a lot about your health.

In a day we all visit the bathroom many times to pee but, seldom does it cross our mind to check our Pee colour before we flush it out of sight.

Urine/ Pee is body’s waste products in a liquid form mainly made of water, salt and chemical called urea and uric acid.

Kidney creates urine by flushing out toxins and all the bad stuff from the blood. A lot of factors like medications, food, and illness can affect the urine colour or odour.When there is a malfunction, it contains clues to the problem. The colour of the urine can be a helpful indicator.

Ideally, the colour of the urine should be pale yellow colour. It indicates you are well hydrated. The pale yellow colour is because of the pigment produced by the body called—UROCHROME and UROBILIN.

Let’s understand how the colour of the urine describes your health. There are three main causes for abnormal urine colour

Food that you eat
Drugs or Medication that you take
Health Issues

What does Colour of the Urine Indicate?

Transparent: If the pee colour is completely clear, its sign of over hydration. Sometimes excess hydration may lead to dilution of salts in the body.

Brown colour: If you are noticing shades of brown in your urine.Then it may be a sign that you are dehydrated. It can also indicate the problem in the liver. If there is liver disease, some of the bile salts that the liver should be processing and eliminate through stool are hanging around in blood and thus end up in the urine.

Note: If you eat a lot of aloe, fava beans, or rhubarb, these foods can also turn your urine brown.

Red colour: If your urine colour is red. Foods like beets and blackberries can do it. But if it persists for more days then it can be a sign of blood in the urine(hematuria) which can happen due to kidney disease or urinary tract infections (UTI) or cancers. So, In this case, contact doctor immediately.

Blue or Green colour: Good amount of consumption of asparagus can lead to green colour. But, certain medications, genetic diseases, and UTI can also make your pee green.

Orange: When your pee is the colour of a citrus flavoured soft drink, it’s probably because of medicines like high-dose vitamin B2, the UTI drug phenazopyridine, or the antibiotic isoniazid

Dark yellow: It indicates that your body is very much dehydrated. It is also linked to your Vitamin stash- B Vitamins, especially B12 results in this dramatic hue change.

Cloudy or milky: Don’t just pay attention to the colour of your pee. Cloudy or milky urine most often indicates the presence of white blood cells and may indicate an infection.

Bubbles/frothy urine: Excessive bubbles or ‘frothing’ that happens every time you urinate can indicate an excess of protein in your urine.

Does your urine smell?

Pee doesn’t usually have a strong smell. But, some foods — especially asparagus, which has a smelly sulphur compound can change the odour. So, you should vitamin B-6 supplements. When you’re dehydrated and your pee gets very concentrated, it can smell strongly of ammonia.

Normal urine should have a slight odour. Sometimes strong odour like ammonia may indicate a urinary tract infection, and if it smells sweet, it may be a sign of excess sugar and diabetes.

How often should you urinate?

It can be different for everyone but, normally people need to empty bladder up to 8times a day.

If you notice you suddenly have to pee more often than usual, it could be a sign of a health problem like a UTI, diabetes, an enlarged prostrate in men, vaginitis in women, or a problem with the wall of your bladder called interstitial cystitis.

Urine is something that most of us must take a look and prevent any conditions to prevail.

Keep yourself well hydrated and stay healthy!!

June 28, 2017 By Luke Coutinho 2 Comments

All you want to know about Inflammation

When you think pain, think inflammation.   Inflammation is a good thing. It’s your body’s way of rising up to fight out germs/bacteria/infections, heal bruises when you fall, heal torn ligaments/tissues/tendons etc. Once it does its job of fighting out these invaders or foreign organisms, the inflammation should reduce back down to normal. The problem arises when that does not happen.

Have a torn ligament or muscle pull that you are struggling to heal? Seen the best doctors, therapists etc and still not fixed?Struggling with arthritis and joint pain?  Check your CRP (C-Reactive protein) levels and focus on reducing inflammation. The cure is in reducing inflammation.

Many of us live with chronic inflammation and that’s dangerous. It’s also one of the reason people –struggle to lose weight, experience excruciating joint pains, age faster than normal feel tired through the day, higher chances of cancer and heart disease, Fibromalgia / Headaches/Migraines, higher chances of Alzheimer’s/dementia, struggle with diabetes, feel depressed and low.

Silent inflammation like the ones described above can destroy your nerves and cellular health, suppressing and weakening your immune system, leading to deadly diseases like cancer, etc.  

What’s scary is the fact that you can be extremely healthy and fit, but silent inflammation could be eating into you from inside, which is one of the many explainable reasons why cancer or heart attacks can strike down a healthy and young human being. Checking cholesterol levels, Vitamin D3, B12, SGOT, SGTP is imperative, but what most people miss out on is checking their CRP levels. (C-Reactive protein). This is an important protein level to check and a simple blood test will cover that for you.This level will tell you volumes about the amount of inflammation you have in your body.

In my years of experience what stands out in a cancer report of a person is an increase in CRP levels and white blood cells and the immediate action is to reduce inflammation thru food and lifestyle change. Diseases breathe in inflamed environments, in environments that are acidic and in environments where there is less oxygen supply to the cells.

Overtraining causes inflammation. Vigorous exercise, inconsistent exercise and high-intensity training which is not planned for your body type will make your CRP levels soar and kill your immunity, which is why many trainers ask their clients to take a Vitamin C and E-post workouts.

Running marathons without proper nutrition causes massive inflammation. Stress causes inflammation (chronic stress). Improper nutrition (high-fat foods, sugar, artificial sweeteners, doughnuts, white sugar, aerated drinks, salty foods, packaged foods), and Smoking causes inflammation. (I’ve seen CRP levels fall in a smokers’ blood report within 10 days of kicking the butt)  .

How to keep your inflammation in check:

Smart and moderate exercise such as meditation and controlling your stress and BP levels, nuts and seeds, green leafy veggies and fruits, good fats ( like nuts, olive oil, coconut oil) helps in keeping your inflammation under check. Finally, I should not be saying this but it has been proven that a small amount of alcohol can actually lower CRP levels.Vitamin D3 Curcumin (turmeric extract) is one of the best spice based inflammation fighters.

June 24, 2017 By Anusha Subramanian 3 Comments

From Carefree to a Carer

She considers herself a shy and an introvert person who likes to hide behind her pen and paper but, you start talking to her and you will realise that Samara Mahindra is very poised, articulate and has designed a beautiful life for herself that is all about making a difference in other people’s lives.

Her 3 life’s lessons learnt in a short span of time are

Don’t be bound by physical reality (What you see),

You can achieve more than you think you can
Be in the present ( forget the past and don’t think about the future)

“This I have learnt from my mum- stand on your own feet and all is in your hands how to shape it for yourself,” says Samara, in conversation with Vishal Gondal on “Beneath the Force-The Vishal Gondal Show’.

Having lost her mother to Cancer and being left alone to make her choices and take her decisions, Samara’s eyes opened to a lot of brutal realities during her mother’s long journey of struggle with Cancer. She went on to study Integrative Life style medicine and also get a certification in Cancer Exercise Specialist.

“Once I came back from the US after my studies, I did an Observership with Tata Memorial and what I found was that hospitals were not a healing place for patients. And, doctors never gave any proper answer. That is when I decided on Carer Program where a specialist would be taken to the patient and treated in the confines of their home,” she says.

The oncology ward of numerous hospitals became her home where she witnessed extreme cases and dire situations that were unimaginable. She watched blank refusals of curable stage cancer treatment to those who didn’t have the funding and children who saw hospital wards before a classroom. This was the beginning of her carefree to an entrepreneurial journey ‘The Carer Program’.

The CARER Program is an integrative cancer recovery program that helps a patient recover from the side effects of treatment and cancer itself. CARER provides a holistic approach to healing through complementary therapies that target nutrition, movement and mind-body healing for patients post treatment.

Prior to becoming an entrepreneur, Samara kept looking for an escapist route to avoid going back home. So she travelled to Australia and UK for studies and then worked in Singapore and even attended a 3-month acting course with Barry John in Mumbai. She says the acting course was therapeutic and help build her confidence and come out of her shell.

Talking of her success habits Samara says that being disciplined has helped her a lot in her work.

Secondly, having a sense of empathy without sympathy and looking at the situation very positively and passing on that positivity to the patients has been the biggest success.

She admits to being a big fan of Tim Ferris and has read all his books and believes in the 4 Hour Work Week. The 4 Hour Work week is a book by Tim Ferris where he refers to a ‘lifestyle design’

and repudiates the traditional ‘deferred’ life plan in which people work gruelling hours and take few vacations for decades and save money in order to relax after retirement.

Listen to the Podcast here: https://youtu.be/yV0naFwElfo

June 20, 2017 By Farida Gohil 5 Comments

5 foods that fight high CHOLESTEROL

Image Credit: prevention.com

It’s easy to eat your way to an alarmingly high cholesterol level. The reverse is true too – changing what you eat can lower your cholesterol and improve the armada of fats floating through your bloodstream. Fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and “good fats” are all part of a heart-healthy diet. But, some foods particularly are good at helping bring down cholesterol.

How? Some cholesterol-lowering foods deliver a good dose of soluble fibre, which binds cholesterol and its precursors in the digestive system and drags them out of the body before they get into circulation.Others provide polyunsaturated fats, which directly lower LDL. And, those with plant sterols and stanols keep the body from absorbing cholesterol. Here are a 5 of those foods:

OATS: An easy way to start lowering cholesterol is to choose oatmeal or a cold oat-based cereal like cheerios for breakfast. It gives you 1 to 2 grammes of soluble fibre. Add a banana or some strawberries for another half -gramme.
BEANS: Beans are especially rich in soluble fibre and take a while to digest, meaning you feel full for longer hours after a meal. That’s one reason beans are useful food for folks trying to lose weight. With so many choices from navy and kidney beans to lentils, garbanzos, black-eyed peas, and beyond, there are also many ways to prepare them. Beans a very versatile food.
NUTS: A bushel of studies shows that eating almonds, walnuts, peanuts, and other nuts are good for the heart. Eating 2 ounces of nuts a day can slightly lower LDL, on the order of 5%. Nuts have additional nutrients that protect the heart in other ways.

If you are allergic to any kind of nuts like peanuts, Walnuts or cashew nuts; you can go for pistachios or just almonds or if nothing works then you can just quit this food group and try to include the other four foods.

Foods fortified with sterols and stanols: Sterols and stanols extracted from plants gum up the body’s ability to absorb cholesterol from food. Companies and adding them to foods ranging from margarine and granola bars to orange juice and chocolate. They are also available as supplements.Getting 2 grammes of plant sterols or stanols a day can lower LDL cholesterol by about 10%.
FATTY FISH: Eating fish two or three times a week can lower LDL in two ways: by replacing meat, which has LDL -boosting saturated fats, and by delivering LDL -lowering Omega- 3 fats. Omega -3 s reduce triglycerides in the bloodstream and also protect the heart by helping prevent the onset of abnormal heart rhythms.

BUT STAY AWAY FROM…

As you consider eating more of the foods that can help lower down cholesterol, keep in mind that avoiding certain foods can improve your results. To keep cholesterol levels where you want them to be, limit intake of:

SATURATED FATS: The saturated fats found in red meat, milk and other Dairy Foods, and coconut and palm oil directly boost LDL. So one way to lower your LDL is to cut back on saturated fat. Try substituting extra- lean ground beef for regular; Low-fat or skim milk for whole milk; olive oil or a vegetable oil margarine for butter; baked fish or chicken for fried.

TRANS FAT: Trans fats are a by-product of the chemical reaction that turns liquid vegetable oil into solid margarine or shortening and that prevents liquid vegetable oils from turning rancid. Trans fats boost LDL as much as saturated fats do.They also lower protective HDL and increase the tendency for blood clots to form inside blood vessels. Although Trans fats were once ubiquitous in prepared foods, many companies now use trans- free alternatives. Summer restaurants and fast-food chains have yet to make the switch.