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So you've decided to go cold turkey? You can white knuckle it and try to make it through on your own, or you can relieve much of the stress from withdrawals with the following supplements.
Vitamins and minerals to take to help quit smoking:
Vitamin C - 1,000 mg twice daily (remember to titrate down if you stop taking vitamin C)
B Complex vitamins - 1 or 2 a day (never take one B vitamin for any length of time - it will make you deficient in the others)
Calcium and magnesium - once a day
Vitamin C will help you flush toxins and nicotine from the body. This powerful antioxidant helps flush heavy metals from your body, including cadmium and lead.
Withdrawals are difficult and you will be irritable, to say the least. B vitamins are nature's valium. They will help you sleep and calm your nerves. It is important to take a high quality B complex. Many people choose B6 or B12 for stress relief. But B vitamins work together and they need one another to work their best. In addition, studies have shown that any long term use of one B vitamin can cause a deficiency in another. So always take B vitamins in a B complex.
Calcium and magnesium work together. Magnesium is very calming. Many of us are deficient in magnesium. Soaking in epsom salts will also help you to detox as it floods your cells with magnesium. Take a 40 minute soak using 1 cup of epsom salts per 100 lbs of body weight. The first 20 minutes releases toxins. During the second 20 minutes, you will absorb magnesium. At the end of that time you will be able to taste it. This is a sign that all of your tissues have soaked up magnesium.
Diet to help you stop smoking
There is a strong relationship between nicotine and blood sugar. When we withdraw nicotine, our blood sugar is low. This is what causes fatigue and sugar cravings when you quit smoking. If you resort to sugar for a fast boost, you will start a cycle of sugar highs and crashes that will only make your cravings worse.
Start with a healthy diet. A truly healthy diet is a whole foods diet with a wide variety of nutrient dense foods. Your diet should consist of 80% raw, organic, fresh produce - more fruits than vegetables.
When you are first withdrawing from nicotine, focus on healthy protein and produce. Avoid starches and simple carbs. For the first three days of withdrawals, however, you may need a little boost of sugar when those cravings hit. Drink a cup of fruit juice, but follow it twenty minutes later with protein.
Snack on veggies throughout the day along with whole fruits. And drink plenty of liquids. Cranberry lemonade is a great detox drink. See the link below for the recipe. A gallon a day, sipped throughout the day will help flush the toxins from your body and reduce cravings.
Conclusion
You can do this. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that you can't stop because you have tried before and failed. It doesn't matter if you have failed a hundred times. Just do it. You can win.
For more information, be sure to check out Natural Remedies for Anxiety, and How to Quit Smoking Naturally and http://www.naturalnews.com.
In a new study from Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute (Sanford-Burnham), researchers have used human pluripotent stem cells to generate new hair. The study represents the first step toward the development of a cell-based treatment for people with hair loss. In the United States alone, more than 40 million men and 21 million women are affected by hair loss. The research was published online in PLOS One yesterday.
"We have developed a method using human pluripotent stem cells to create new cells capable of initiating human hair growth. The method is a marked improvement over current methods that rely on transplanting existing hair follicles from one part of the head to another," said Alexey Terskikh, Ph.D., associate professor in the Development, Aging, and Regeneration Program at Sanford-Burnham. "Our stem cell method provides an unlimited source of cells from the patient for transplantation and isn't limited by the availability of existing hair follicles."
The research team developed a protocol that coaxed human pluripotent stem cells to become dermal papilla cells. They are a unique population of cells that regulate hair-follicle formation and growth cycle. Human dermal papilla cells on their own are not suitable for hair transplants because they cannot be obtained in necessary amounts and rapidly lose their ability to induce hair-follicle formation in culture.
"In adults, dermal papilla cells cannot be readily amplified outside of the body and they quickly lose their hair-inducing properties," said Terskikh. "We developed a protocol to drive human pluripotent stem cells to differentiate into dermal papilla cells and confirmed their ability to induce hair growth when transplanted into mice."
"Our next step is to transplant human dermal papilla cells derived from human pluripotent stem cells back into human subjects," said Terskikh. "We are currently seeking partnerships to implement this final step."
We've all had it drilled into us: citrus fruits are the source for vitamin C. But citrus fruits aren't the only source. They aren't even the best source! The amount of vitamin C in one serving of papaya, strawberries, pineapple, bell pepper, broccoli, or Brussels sprouts exceeds the amount of vitamin C in a medium orange.
Many fruits are high in vitamin C. Here is a list from The World's Healthiest Foods of the fruits and vegetables with 50% or more of the daily requirement of vitamin C in each serving.
Fruits Highest in Vitamin C
Papaya (one medium) - 224% (Papaya seeds can be dried and used like black pepper; makes great enzyme supplement)
Strawberries (one cup) - 113%
Pineapple (one cup) - 105%
Oranges (one medium) - 93%
Kiwi - (1 - 2 in) 85% (Eat the peels!)
Cantaloupe (1 cup) - 78%
Grapefruit (1/2) - 59%
What is surprising is the number of vegetables that meet the criteria.
Vegetables highest in vitamin C
Bell Peppers (1 cup red or yellow) - 157% (green peppers are unripe peppers)
Broccoli (1 cup) - 135%
Brussels sprouts (1 cup) - 129%
Cauliflower (1 cup) - 73%
Kale (1 cup) - 71%
Cabbage (1 cup) - 69%
Bok Choy (1 cup) - 59%
Parsley (1 cup) - 54%
Turnip greens (1 cup) - 53%
Sweet potato (1 cup) - 52%
Vitamin C is needed for the immune system, but that is not its only claim to fame. Vitamin C is needed for many physiological functions. It is an anti-oxidant. It is a co-factor for eight enzymes, thereby aiding in developing and maintaining scar tissue, blood vessels, cartilage, hormonal stability, biosynthesis of neurotransmitters, and transport of fatty acids into mitochondria.
So how can you mix and match some of the veggies and fruits above to deliver a power dose of vitamin C to your diet? A fruit salad? Yeah, that's an easy way. But let's look at a more creative recipe.
Beautiful and delicious kale salad
1 bunch of kale
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1 red bell pepper
1 tart apple
handful of walnuts
handful of raisins
1 lime
honey to taste
Tear the kale into edible pieces, saving the stems for another recipe or thinly slicing them for this salad.
Sprinkle olive oil over the leaves (use a little more or a little less as needed) and massage the oil into the leaves with both hands until the leaves become soft and pliant.
Add sliced red pepper, chopped apples, raisins, and walnuts.
Juice one lime. Add honey to taste and whisk. Pour over salad and mix well.
Enjoy!
A common nutritional supplement may be part of the magic in improving the survival rates of babies born with heart defects, researchers report.
Carnitine, a compound that helps transport fat inside the cell powerhouse where it can be used for energy production, is currently used for purposes ranging from weight loss to chest pain.
New research shows it appears to normalize the blood vessel dysfunction that can accompany congenital heart defects and linger even after corrective surgery, said Dr. Stephen M. Black, cell and molecular physiologist at the Vascular Biology Center at the Medical College of Georgia at Georgia Regents University.
"My hope is this is going to have a major, major impact on survival of babies," Black said. About half the babies born with heart defects have excessive, continuous high pressure on their lungs from misdirected blood flow. Early surgery can prevent full-blown pulmonary vascular disease, but scientists are finding more subtle disruptions in the signaling inside blood vessels walls that can be problematic - even deadly - up to 72 hours after surgery.
The good news is the changes are reversible and that carnitine speeds recovery and can even prevent the damage in a lamb model of these human heart defects, according to studies published in the journal Pediatric Research.
Normally, most blood flow bypasses the lungs in utero when the placenta provides blood and oxygen for the baby. Baby's first breaths naturally expand the lungs and blood vessels, activating a process inside the lining of vessels that enables them to accommodate the initial blood surge, then reduce pressure quickly, dramatically and permanently.
This natural transition doesn't occur when heart defects misdirect blood flow. "It's kind of like a chronic fetal-to-newborn transition," said Black, the study's corresponding author. Lungs get pounded with about three times the normal flow and, even when surgeries are done as early as possible to repair the defect, correct blood flow and protect the lungs, the 20 percent death rates from acute pulmonary hypertension have remained unchanged for a decade. "That's 1 in 5 kid (with this condition)," Black said.
Left unchecked, the barrage thickens blood vessels, making them unresponsive, much like those of an elderly individual who has lived for years with uncontrolled high blood pressure. The comparatively brief periods of pounding these babies experience impairs the ability of the endothelial cells, which line blood vessels, to produce nitric oxide, a major dilator of blood vessels.
The shear force disrupts carnitine homeostasis, weakens the mitochondria (the cell powerhouse) and impairs nitric oxide production. To make bad matters worse, the precursor to nitric oxide instead makes more peroxynitrite, prompting endothelial cells to grow and thickening blood vessels. Black was also corresponding author of a recent study in the Journal of Biological Chemistry that showed peroxynitrite does this by turning on the cell survival protein kinase Akt1.
The new study indicates that even without fixing the heart defect, high daily doses of carnitine in the first four weeks of life can prevent endothelial dysfunction. In fact, the laboratory lambs' ability to make nitric oxide is preserved even without the benefit of heart surgery and the responses to the chemical activity that enables blood vessel dilation is normalized, Black said.
Schizophrenia is a disabling brain disorder characterized by the inability to tell reality from imagination, according to the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Symptoms are broken down into two types called "positive symptoms," which include hallucinations and delusions, and "negative symptoms" which include social withdrawal, apathy, and a lack of emotional expressiveness. While drugs have been found to help many with the positive type of symptoms, too often there's no help for the negative variety - until now. A new study has found that taking dietary supplements folate and vitamin B12 can alleviate these symptoms in some patients.
In a new placebo-controlled study of 140 patients with schizophrenia, a research team based at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) found improvement across all participants when folate and B12 were added to their regular treatments. But the results were most significant in those carrying specific variants in genes involved with folate metabolism.
The report has just been published in JAMA Psychiatry (formerly Archives of General Psychiatry) online. It's the first study designed specifically to investigate whether supplementation with folate and B12 (which increases the effects of folate) can treat the symptoms of schizophrenia.
"The symptoms of schizophrenia are complex, and antipsychotic medications provide no relief for some of the most disabling parts of the illness. These include negative symptoms, which can be particularly devastating," Joshua Roffman, MD, MMSc, of the MGH Department of Psychiatry, corresponding author of the JAMA Psychiatry paper, said in a media statement.
"Our finding that folate plus vitamin B12 supplementation can improve negative symptoms opens a new potential avenue for treatment of schizophrenia. Because treatment effects differed based on which genetic variants were present in each participant, the results also support a personalized medical approach to treating schizophrenia."
So why would the essential nutrient folate (often found in supplements in the folic acid form) have a positive impact on the devastating condition known as schizophrenia? In their paper, the researchers note that folate is necessary for the synthesis of DNA and neurotransmitters and it plays a role in the control of gene expression. Previous studies have linked folate deficiency during pregnancy with an increased risk of schizophrenia among offspring. Earlier research by members of the MGH-based team found low blood folate levels were associated with the more severe, negative symptoms among patients with schizophrenia.
"Folate plays a critical role in DNA methylation, which regulates gene expression, so it's plausible that its effects on negative symptoms act through gene expression changes," Dr. Roffman, an assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, explained in a media statement. "Participants with the low-functioning FOLH1 variant (a gene involved in folate metabolism) might eventually show a benefit of folate supplementation if treated for a longer period of time, but that needs to be investigated in future studies."
"Understanding more about the basic neural mechanisms of folate in patients with schizophrenia could help us generate more targeted and effective interventions to reduce and possibly even prevent symptoms."
A new study published in The Clinical Journal of Pain found that obese individuals who have knee osteoarthritis and healthy vitamin D levels demonstrated higher functional performance than obese participants with insufficient vitamin D levels.
Osteoarthritis is the most common form of arthritis, affecting more than 20 million people in the United States. It occurs when the protective cartilage at the end of your bones wears down as you age. Osteoarthritis most commonly affects joints in your hips, spine, hands, and knees.
Obesity is one of the most significant and modifiable risk factor for osteoarthritis. Due to the increasing rate of obese older adults, the prevalence of knee osteoarthritis is also rising.
Vitamin D levels, obesity, and aging are all associated with adverse health outcomes, including chronic pain. Researchers recently investigated the influence of vitamin D levels and obesity on knee arthritis pain and functional performance.
The researchers assessed the vitamin D levels, functional performance, and pain of 256 middle-aged and older adults with knee osteoarthritis. The participants provided a self-report of knee pain and completed functional performance tasks that included balancing, walking and rising from a sitting position to a standing position.
The researchers found healthy vitamin D levels were significantly associated with less knee osteoarthritis pain compared to participants with deficient or insufficient levels, regardless of obesity status. Those with healthy vitamin D levels could also walk, balance and rise from sitting to standing better than obese participants with insufficient levels.
Lead researcher, Toni Glover, stated, “Vitamin D is inexpensive, available over-the-counter and toxicity is fairly rare.”
“Older obese patients with chronic pain should discuss their vitamin D status with their primary care provider. If it’s low, take a supplement and get judicious sun exposure.”