The critical second cup
That scenario, of course, is played out everyday, in countries all over the world – thousands of people are suddenly faced with a serious health challenge that was probably the furthest thing from their minds when they woke up in the morning.
It’s alarming to think of stroke this way, beyond the statistics, on a human scale. But the fact is, these numbers don’t have to be that high. Because there is at least one simple thing that we can all do to considerably lower our risk of stroke.
To Your Good Health,Copyright 1997-2002 by Institute of Health Sciences, L.L.C.
Jenny Thompson
Health Sciences Institute
Sources:
“Plasma Vitamin C Modifies the Association Between Hypertension and Risk of Stroke” Stroke 2002;33:1568
“Low Vitamin C Intake Ups Stroke Risk: Report” Reuters Health
So if you drink a glass of orange juice for breakfast each day, have another at lunchtime or dinner. That should be enough to help put you where you want to be: in the group with less risk of stroke. And of course it goes without saying (but you know I’ll say it anyway) that if you maintain a reasonable body weight, control your blood pressure, don’t smoke and keep the alcohol consumption at a moderate level, you’ll do your cardiovascular system a world of good.
Tomorrow I’ll tell you about another study that shows how a simple and easy dietary change before a stroke can improve stroke recovery and perhaps even save your life.
The research team followed 2,419 randomly selected men who had no history of stroke. The men ranged in age from 42 to 60 at the outset of the study. Over a period of 10 years, the researchers took blood samples, measured blood pressure and assessed body weight. At the end of the study period 120 men had developed a stroke; 96 were ischemic (inadequate oxygen to the brain) and 24 hemorrhagic (internal bleeding in the brain).
After adjusting for factors such as alcohol intake and history of smoking, the researchers reached two significant conclusions. One: subjects who showed the lowest level of vitamin C in their blood were almost two and a half times more likely to experience a stroke than subjects with the highest amount of vitamin C. And tw subjects who had high blood pressure, were overweight, and had low levels of vitamin C were a full three times more likely to suffer a stroke than overweight subjects with high blood pressure whose blood samples showed the highest levels of vitamin C.
Beyond these very positive results there is a factor in this study that we’ve come across again and again: antioxidants. The Finland team believes that it’s the antioxidant properties of vitamin C that help prevent the buildup of plaque in the arteries, and in general helps strengthen the artery walls.
