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Can you believe the holiday season is already here? It seems like just yesterday we were toasting champagne and talking about the year to come. Well we blinked and it’s already here. This is the time most of our healthy lifestyles take a step backward. The endless parties, family gatherings and don’t forget those delicious leftovers (you know you love them)! According to a recent Weight Watchers report, the average American gains around 7-10 pounds between Thanksgiving and New Years Day. I want to help you be better than just average, because I believe in you. First, as with any battle (and this is a battle with yourself) you must plan. So for the next few weeks we are going to help guide you through this minefield of calories. You must have a plan! Always assume there will be an assortment of bad choices and be prepared to work around them. Try bringing a healthy option to the party (we are known for our salads). This way you know you have a least one healthy choice. Fill your plate with the healthy option, and then just have a few small “tastes” of some splurge items. A big part of the plan is never go to the party hungry. Eat something light ahead of time so you can make choices with your head and not your stomach. A good option would be an apple with a handful of almonds, or some Greek yogurt with fresh berries. The protein in both of these examples will help keep you full and satisfied. Another good calorie saver is to drink one water to every adult beverage you have. Speaking of adult beverages, stay away from high calorie frozen drinks like margaritas and daiquiris (these can have anywhere from 400-800 calories per drink!) This will help you keep from drinking all of your calories (not to mention staying hydrated to avoid a headache!) So in conclusion PLAN, PLAN, PLAN.

Cooking tip.

Put your gravy in the refrigerator and let it harden, then skim off the top layer of fat then reheat. This one tip can save you up to 56 grams of fat per cup. (Of course no gravy at all is the best option, but hey, it IS Thanksgiving!)

Yours in health,

Colleen Riddle

P.S. Quick Calorie Burning Workout

Warm Up for at least 5 minutes, 1 Minute jumping jacks, 30 seconds rest, 1 minute jogging in place, 30 second rest, 1 minute running stairs, 30 second rest, 1 minute jump rope (or fake rope) 30 second rest; repeat as many times as possible depending on how much time you have. Make sure to cool down and stretch when finished!

Colleen Riddle, Creator of New Mommy Makeover and owner of Elite Physique Personal Training in Destin, FL is an AFPA Certified Pre/Post Natal Exercise Specialist and an ACE Personal Trainer. New Mommy Makeover is a result-proven, realistic approach to help women lose weight and counter the effects of pregnancy. It was reviewed by Fit Pregnancy Magazine as one of the top postnatal DVDs in 2011. The DVD just won first place in the 2011 Sheknows.com Parenting Award for the best post pregnancy workout DVD! Visit http://newmommymakeover.com

We have all heard of all the healthy foods that we should have in our healthy eating menu. Having balanced meals in a healthy menu is quite easy with all this information on eating healthy. There are so many sources of information and guides to creating a healthy menu for daily living that people have access to. This information is detailed with all the benefits of eating healthy and all the detrimental effects of not sticking to a healthy eating menu. However with all these guidelines on how to eat healthy, it is also important to know what not to compromise on when it comes to a healthy menu.

GMOs are a latest feature in the food market, providing a larger and faster yielding variety of foods to the people. But with the level of controversy surrounding these types of foods, they should not feature in your healthy eating menu. This is because the nutrient quality is affected by the procedures and additions of chemicals and artificial fertilizers that the growth of these foods. A healthy menu should contain foods of excellent nutrient quality. Foods that do not have this quality should be exempted from a healthy eating menu.

Highly processed and packaged foods are also a no-go zone in a healthy eating menu. This is because these foods are usually added with artificial preservatives and passed through many processing procedures to ensure that all bacteria is destroyed to ensure that they last longer in the shelves. The problem with such foods in the healthy menu is that the same procedure used to destroy the bacteria also affects some of the nutrients and vitamins in the food making the nutrient quality much lacking. For your healthy eating menu, always go for fresh produce as it does not contain these preservatives which are not good for your health.

Finally, fast food and foods from restaurants cannot be classified as foods to be part of a healthy eating menu. You cannot add these foods in a healthy menu as these foods are usually prepared in mass amounts and overcooking or using excess oil and salt among other types of seasoning can always occur. Unless you have overseen the full process of the preparation of the foods in a healthy menu, anything else does not suffice. A healthy menu should contain. A healthy eating menu should contain foods that have been prepared with detailed precision ensuring that the nutrient quality is preserved through the whole preparation process.

Healthy eating menu is a topic that everyone should be aware of. There are a lot of advantages that people can get from eating the right kinds of food. If you want to learn more about this topic, all you have to do is to download a free eBook on my website.

Before I get into showing you how to lose weight without dieting there is something that you need to become aware of. What you need to know is the fact that the whole concept of weight loss is about burning more calories than what you are eating every day in your meals. This is a concept that you have to understand and if you can’t then burning fat is going to be next to impossible for you to do.

Now I’m about to give you a lot of helpful tips and methods that can help you lose weight without dieting because dieting is only one aspect of losing weight. When you are dieting, what you need to worry about is making sure you know how to lower the amount of calories you consume every day.

What you need to focus on is creating a calorie deficit of 500 so that you aren’t eating 500 less calories than what you are used to everyday. By the end of the week you want to know that you have met a calorie deficit of 3500 because you have eliminated 3500 calories from your weekly eating, and a lot of people don’t know this but you have to burn 3500 calories in order for your body to lose 1 pound of fat.

The second thing you need to do aside from creating a good calorie deficit is exercising more often. The first exercise we need to get into is running. Running is a cardiovascular exercise that can help you burn hundreds of calories at a phenomenal rate, and by this I mean that you can burn hundreds of calories in 1 mile.

You should most definitely consider running as your primary weight loss exercise because you can burn up to 1000 calories every day just by running a couple miles or so. Another issue that we need to become clear on is the fact that weight loss does not equate to fat loss, let me explain. When you are losing weight you are just losing fat because you could also be losing water weight and muscle tissue as well.

This is the reason why people are able to lose a lot of weight in only a week because they’re mainly only losing water weight and muscle mass, but they have not lost any fat whatsoever. Slow weight loss is like losing 2 pounds a week which is an absolutely great pace to strive for. We need to focus on losing fat and not losing weight, and just keep that in mind since you want to know how to lose weight without dieting.

IF YOU SERIOUSLY WANT TO START DIETING OR LOSING WEIGHT, PLEASE VISIT HERE ====>How to Lose Weight

Many people have become increasingly suspicious of medical doctors and the pharmaceutical industry, especially since it is inextricably entwined with the corporate money chase. Many drugs promoted by the pharmaceutical industry have caused serious health problems, and even fatalities, so it is no wonder that alternative medicine has become a popular health and wellness method for those disenchanted with mainstream medicine. One product that has become more and more popular since the 1990′s is colloidal silver. Let’s take a look at what colloidal silver is, what it does, and if it is a viable alternative to mainstream pharmaceuticals.

Colloidal silver is a suspension of particles of silver in a water-base liquid that is marketed as a kind of cure all natural treatment for various ailments, most notably as an anti-microbial and antiseptic. Silver has been employed for medicinal purposes for almost 1000 years; it was used by the ancient Greeks and Phoenicians to ward of disease and infection and was used to treat infections before the invention of antibiotics, particularly during World War I. Currently, it is marketed as an alternative to antibiotics and as an anti-viral and many people it has cured ailments from conjunctivitis to pneumonia.

As with all forms of alternative medicine, the debate around the usefulness and safety of colloidal silver is heated. Many medical doctors claim that there is no evidence strong enough to come to the conclusion that colloidal silver can cure or reduce the symptoms of any ailments, and colloidal silver is not considered a viable treatment option for any health problem. However, many doctors in the field of alternative medicine, and a few outside of it, swear that colloidal silver is an excellent, natural aid to help fight and ward off infection, citing many examples of people who have used it and been cured or seen a significant improvement in their condition. As far as the safety of the supplement goes, most doctors on both sides of the fence agree that taking colloidal silver is harmless, although chronic ingestion of silver can lead to a condition known as argyria or a mass accumulation of silver deposits in the eye.

Is colloidal silver right for you?

The use of antibiotics is so widespread that it is leading to the development of bacteria and infections that are resistant to them. This is becoming a problem that the medical community is viewing with growing concern. Alternative antimicrobials are very much a trend right now in light of this situation. However, using and antimicrobial like colloidal silver is something you should not take lightly-it is always in your best interest to talk to a doctor you trust and get a second opinion if needed. However, it is also important to note that many mainstream doctors will always be in the service of pharmaceutical industries, so you must weigh their input with as much bias as you do a doctor of alternative medicine. Ultimately, it is up to you to make a decision about using colloidal silver for medicinal purposes, but don’t do so without seriously investigating and weighing your options.

About the Author

Maureen Hamilton is an Integrated Neuro-Linguistic Programming Master Practitioner, Hypnotherapist and a Demartini Method Facilitator. Maureen has previously worked in many areas of health in Australia as well as overseas. Her health background includes training in general and midwifery nursing, mental health and children’s behavioural issues (including the effects of emotional trauma especially in children). Maureen is very much involved in promoting and assisting people to obtain optimal health and is absolutely committed to helping people to stop smoking and/or lose weight naturally using Hypnosis and NLP.
If you would like to find out more, visit http://masteryourlifepower.com and and talk to Maureen about your requirements.

The HCG Diet has come into existence as the most popular diet plan in America. The results are fantastic and patients are often able to lose 1 to 3 pounds a day. Patients either utilize subcutaneous injections with the hormone, or sublingual drops under the tongue to receive the hormone.

One consideration for women on the diet is the type of makeup they use. Why? HCG is short for human chorionic gonadotropin and is well known as the pregnancy hormone. In fact, it is approved by the FDA only for fertility. Otherwise, using it for an indication such as weight loss, is an off label indication. This means it is legal for physicians to use as they deem effective, but it’s not what it was approved for by the FDA. The FDA has not shown it to be harmful, there just has not been significant research to approve it for a weight loss indication.

The hormone HCG targets fat reserves. In pregnant women, for instance, the hormone allows the body to break down fat then utilize that fat for baby nutrition. This could be an issue for the composition of the makeup being use. If women use makeup that is oil or sweetener based or contains other products that can be absorbed, this could result in the targeted fat to be from the makeup and not from the typical bodily fat reserves.

This may not be a big issue. But if you are going to the trouble to go on a diet to lose as much weight as possible, do you really want something as simple as the makeup you use to retard your weight loss?

To be on the safe side use mineral based makeup. The mineral oil used in these makeups is unscented, tasteless, and pallid. The Food and Drug Administration has severe value standards set up for mineral oils, which makes them highly disinfected and refined. They undergo several refining and purifying processes to be established safe and acceptable.

Mineral makeup also contains pure iron which is commonly used to absorb heat. This can make the skin appear younger and smoother. The mineral makeup is fat free and does not contain coarse ingredients. There is not fat or ingredients that turn into fat that the hormone would potentially target to screw up your dieting regimen.

Make sure to check the labels of your makeup, and try to steer clear of those that are not mineral based. It may make an actual difference in your weight loss achievements.

Phoenix Integrative Medicine represents the premier weight loss center in Phoenix and Scottsdale, AZ.

The practice offers top notch Scottsdale and HCG injections Phoenix programs tailored to the individual needs of patients. Programs at the center include HCG diet Phoenix Bioidentical hormones, aesthetic, and anti-aging provided by First Rate Arizona Naturopathic Doctors.

We all love our coffee… it smells fantastic, tastes delicious and get’s us all going in the morning. Plus, one of the health effects of coffee is it’s not going to break your calorie allotment for the day, unless you start adding all the fancy toppings…

A small serving of black coffee has just 7 calories, but add half and half and the number jumps to 46 calories. Liquid nondairy cream adds 48 calories. A single teaspoon of sugar adds 23 calories.

With the good news outweighing the bad in terms of health, coffee has yet to be proven beyond doubt to prevent anything.

Studies typically don’t have people drinking (or skipping) coffee for science, they ask instead about coffee drinking habits, and this isn’t the type of research that shows cause and effect.

Coffee drinkers might have other habits that impact how healthy they are – things like better eating habits, being more active or having some protective genetics.

The average American drank 416 cups of java during 2009. Here’s the latest news on coffee and it’s impact on some pretty serious, life altering conditions.

Type 2 Diabetes has data that’s pretty solid when it comes to coffee drinking. There are over 15 published papers, and the majority of these have found a benefit from coffee on preventing diabetes.

There’s even research that decaffeinated coffee might offer the same beneficial effects as the regular kind. According to researchers, coffee’s benefit comes from the whole package – antioxidants, minerals like magnesium and chromium that help with insulin usage.

We know that type 2 diabetes ups the risk of stroke and heart disease. Coffee drinking has also been associated with reduced risks for heart arrhythmias in both men and women, as well as the chance of stroke in women.

In research involving almost 130,000 participants, those who drank 1 to 3 servings of coffee a day had a 20% less chance of being hospitalized due to abnormal heart rhythms than nondrinkers.

Parkinson’s disease also boasts data that’s always been consistent. Drinking more coffee is linked to a lower risk of Parkinson’s. It might be the caffeine, but no one is sure just how this works.

Dementia, along with Alzheimer’s disease has also been found to be linked to coffee drinking. A study in 2009 in Finland and Sweden found that those who drank 3 to 5 cups a day had a 65% lower chance of being diagnosed with dementia and even Alzheimer’s compared to those who don’t drink, or only occasionally drink coffee.

Cancer of the liver shows consistent data when it comes to coffee drinking too, but it’s weaker in comparison to type 2 diabetes. All of the research has shown that a high coffee intake is associated with a lower chance of liver cirrhosis or cancer. It’s interesting to be sure, but no one is sure how it works and the research demonstrates an association, not cause and effect.

Back in August 2010 coffee intake of 12 ounces per day was found to be safe for pregnant women. But the impact of higher caffeine doses are not known. There is research that finds pregnant women who have too much coffee might be at a higher risk of miscarriage than those who don’t drink or only drink coffee at a moderate level.

But just because there are health effects of coffee, it doesn’t mean it is all good for you. Coffee has antioxidants to be sure, but it hasn’t been shown that drinking coffee brings an increase of antioxidants within the body. Do those ever-helpful antioxidants even show up in the bloodstream after drinking a steaming cup?

And caffeine raises blood pressure along with epinephrine (adrenaline)… this can certainly cause problems. Something else that probably doesn’t rank amongst the good health effects of coffee is that besides getting you going, coffee also has you going… to the bathroom, a lot. Caffeine after all is a mild diuretic… making you need to go more than you normally would. Interestingly, decaf coffee has the same impact as water on urine production.

FREE Bonus Secret Health Reports – For a limited time you can grab 5 FREE essential health reports from the Daily Health Bulletin. Click through now to discover more on the health effects of coffee.

You may not know you have gluten intolerance – but you should be highly suspect if you have elevated liver enzymes.

Gluten intolerance, largely a genetic disorder can cause many health challenges. People who suffer with bloating, constipation and/or diarrhea, fatigue, weight gain, bone or joint pain, dental enamel defects, depression, infertility, anemia, alopecia areata (hair loss), migraines, multiple sclerosis (MS), psoriasis, rheumatoid arthritis, or any of the dozens of other symptoms should suspect their malady to be connected to gluten intolerance.

Elevated liver enzymes may indicate inflammation or damage to cells in the liver. Inflamed or injured liver cells leak higher than normal amounts of certain chemicals, including the enzymes made in the liver, into the bloodstream, which can result in elevated liver enzymes on blood tests. Two common liver enzymes regularly tested in most blood chemistries include AST (aspartate transaminase) and ALT (Alanine transaminase).

AST (aspartate aminotransferase), which was previously called SGOT, can also be elevated in heart and muscle diseases and is not liver specific. The normal range of AST is 0 to 45 U/L

ALT (alanine aminotransferase), which previously was called SGPT, is more specific for liver damage. The normal range of ALT is 0 to 45 U/L

Besides these two enzymes, the liver produces other enzymes, which are special protein based molecules that help necessary chemical reactions to take place. Liver enzymes trigger activity in the body’s cells, speeding up and facilitating naturally occurring biochemical reactions, and maintaining various metabolic processes within the liver.

I regularly see patients who have high liver enzymes of “unknown etiology”, which simply means the cause has not been discovered. One common sign of gluten intolerance is elevation in liver enzymes. Elevated liver related enzymes can lead to additional damage to other parts of the body outside the liver if the cause of the elevated enzymes is not discovered.

I challenged a patient of mine who has had elevated liver enzymes as long as she can remember to get properly tested for gluten intolerance. You probably guessed right – she was gluten intolerant. This patient agreed she should eat gluten free the rest of her life. In one month on a proprietary specialized dietary healing plan, her liver enzymes came down into the normal range, the first time since her liver enzymes have been tested many, many years ago!

Unfortunately most doctors still use tests that are outdated and inaccurate for gluten sensitivity testing. At Johnson Chiropractic Neurology and Nutrition we use the most advanced, state-of-the-art testing gluten intolerance. The tests we use include testing for genes that predispose one to celiac sprue and gluten intolerance (I found I have one of each), as well as a special test that measures ones sensitivity to several components (epitopes) of wheat. Until very recently (January, 2011) testing for Gluten Sensitivity has only been against one component of wheat; alpha gliadin. Through extensive research Cyrex Labs, pinpointed the twelve components of wheat that most often provoke an immune response. You will want to learn more about this specialized testing, especially if you have unexplained elevated liver enzymes.

Dr. Karl R.O.S. Johnson is a chiropractic physician and medical writer in Shelby Township, Michigan. Dr. Johnson’s areas of expertise include chiropractic, functional medicine, functional neurology and spinal rehabilitation. He is the author of the “Ultimate Strategy” series of eBooks on the topics of; fibromyalgia, balance disorders, migraine and other debilitating headaches and well as unresolved thyroid symptoms. For more information and to receive updates on my informative and useful blog, please visit http://www.helpmychronicpain.com/blog or call 586-731-8840.

There are a lot of men and women in the world who are struggling extremely hard to find success with their efforts to lose weight, and some people are in life-threatening situations because of their weight. In this article, you’re going to learn a lot of helpful weight loss tips that you should definitely keep in mind in your journey to get in your dream body.

The first tip that can help you lose weight is you need to be drinking a lot of water on a daily basis. As a matter of fact, you should be drinking water in the morning before you do anything in your day, and before and after every meal that you eat you should drink a glass of water.

Aside from making sure you are consuming a good amount of water every day, the next thing you want to do is make sure you choose the meals you eat wisely. Obviously when you’re trying to lose weight you need to be mindful of the foods you eat because they will either help you lose weight or they will cause you to gain weight.

The foods you need to stay away from are red meat, and instead you should be eating white meat. I also recommend that you incorporate raw fruits into your meals, and instead of drinking those high calorie fruit juices you need to make sure that you are drinking water. My next tip to help you lose weight is that you need to keep in mind that you should only eat when you are hungry and feel the urge to.

So what I mean by this is that you need to exercise discipline instead of eating whenever you feel like it, and avoid any temptation that may come your way that will cause you to overeat on meals and a lot of junk foods. You also need to show discipline when it comes to knowing how to stop eating when you feel full.

Don’t eat until your belt unbuckles, and know that a lot of food that you are eating isn’t even going to get digested by your body because it would just end up as stored fat. Aside from knowing when to stop eating, the next thing you need to focus on is knowing how to reduce the size and portion of your meals.

You want to do this because this is how to follow the concept of burning more calories than what you consume through the foods you eat, so if you are eating small meals you will definitely burn more calories through exercise and dieting.

You also need to keep in mind that you should never skip meals and you need to develop a schedule that you can stick to so that you know when to eat these meals. You definitely don’t want to skip breakfast, and you don’t ever want to go to sleep on a full stomach so make sure that you eat all of your daily meals before seven o’clock. This is how you eat and lose weight in a smart way.

IF YOU SERIOUSLY WANT TO START DIETING OR LOSING WEIGHT, PLEASE VISIT HERE ====>How to Lose Weight

Gaining weight is a very common problem these days due to our lifestyle and food choices. People, who are overweight, are usually trying to lose the weight by using methods that are unhealthy but sound easy and quick. But instead, they can learn how to lose the weight fast and safely. You may find several weight loss programs on the Internet.

Reliable weight loss programs stress the scientific approach, mental preparedness and recommend exercising to lose the weight. They also recommend breaking off bad habits. If you are not honest with yourself, you will not be successful.

If you have a plan to lose weight, you must follow it honestly and consistently in order to obtain results fast and safely. It is most important that you overcome the obvious obstacles in your way such as fast foods, processed meats that are loaded with sodium, sugars and a number of chemicals that your body is not equipped to handle.

Eat balanced meals that consist of proteins, vegetables, fruits and nuts. Also, and this is very important, include an exercising routine into your daily program or an exercising program into your daily routine, no matter how busy it may be.

When you exercise, don’t just work on one part of your body, but if you lack the time for a complete physical workout, then work one part of your body today, another part of your body tomorrow and so on until you have worked on your whole body parts equally. Lack of activity and lack of exercising is one of the major causes of weight increase; you know that another cause is eating the wrong things.

Although you are aware that exercising is important to achieve weight loss, it is just as important to set realistic goals for yourself. Do not think in terms of big numbers to lose in an unrealistic amount of time, remember that you did not gain that weight overnight, so you won’t be able to lose it overnight.

Also be aware that a lot of programs promise that you will lose weight in a particular part of your body, such as your abdomen, but, and so on, but for the most part that is unrealistic, the best program is one that will give your whole body a complete workout and don’t forget your heart. Follow the advice of experts who generally recommend that you do short work out sessions twice or three times a day rather than a single extended rigorous workout session for achieving your goals.

Everywhere you turn you either see or read that diet or diet plans play a key role in losing weight, but I don’t like to use the word “diet”, I prefer to think in terms of a lifestyle change that comprises healthy eating and the proper amount of exercise to effectively shed those extra pounds fast.

Before you start any kind of weight loss program though, you should see your physician and discuss it with him. If you are doing it on your own, then work a calorie plan based on your sex, weight, height and physical activity, then, proceed to cut 500 calories a day from your plan. Do not skip meals, it sends the wrong message to your brain and body. Eat small meals either several times a day, or do three moderate meals with healthy snacks in between. Having breakfast is important, because it helps jump start your metabolism.

Cut down on the consumption of fatty foods and processed meats that are loaded with chemicals, sodium and or corn syrup. Learn to eat fruits, vegetables and nuts. Keep hydrated by drinking plenty of water it suppresses appetite and helps your kidneys. Also minimize the soft drinks or juices with too much sugar. Initially, you will lose weight quickly. However, the process gets a bit slower later on so when this happens, you change your exercise routine. You must stick to the plan to see the results in due time. Bottom line, do not give up!

Incidentally, this article is written by Gladys Alvarez

Gladys Alvarez has done what millions of interested people were hoping for; the legwork concerning weight loss and health issues. With 45 years experience in the health, fitness and weight loss fields; and through extensive research, she has finally eliminated all the hype out of the losing weight plans that are in the online weight loss programs, presenting you with only the very best. As a correspondent who has traveled world wide and experienced first hand the different styles of nutrition in diverse countries. For more information on health issues and weight loss, please visit her website at http://www.problemslosingweight.com TODAY!

Copyright (c) Gladys Alvarez. All Rights Reserved Worldwide.

Our immune system holds the key to good health. During the holidays we become very busy. Although many of our activities are joyous we also experience great stress from all of the social obligations that we are now a part of. Parties, family get togethers, shopping and over indulging in foods and alcoholic beverages can all strain our immune system. Add that to the regular everyday factors such as lack of sunlight, poor air quality and bad diet and you have a recipe for health problems. When the immune system experiences too much stress it can lead to a breakdown which makes us more susceptible to disease and infection. So during this time of year it is very important to incorporate strategies to keep your immune system strong and healthy. There are numerous “superfoods” that are known for their ability to protect cells from damage and give the immune system a needed boost. It is not just eating one particular food that will miraculously improve your health but rather it is the regular use and combining of various superfoods into your daily diet that can really have a beneficial effect on your body.

Garlic: This incredibly wonderful member of the onion family can pack a big punch to strengthening the immune system. This is due to the sulfur compound found in garlic which is known as allicin. Eating garlic can increase white blood cell count and reduce free radicals in the bloodstream. It is also very good for cardiovascular health. There are many ways to include garlic in your diet. You can simply grate some and sautee with vegetables or add to soups and sauces.

Ginger: Ginger contains substances that help fight infections and aid in digestion. Particularly during the holidays when many people maybe overindulging, having a delicious cup of hot ginger tea will treat stomach aches and fight off the flu.

Goji Berries: The now famous goji berries really have great nutritional and immunity enhancing abilities. Rich in vitamin A, you can easily grab a handful to eat any time of day.

Yogurt: The healthy bacteria in yogurt is known as probiotics. Eating yogurt helps to maintain a healthy balance of good flora in your intestinal tract. This is important because a compromised intestinal tract can allow bacteria and viruses to flourish. Try to stick to the yogurts that are not loaded with extra sweeteners. There are many ways to have yogurt including delicious smoothies.

Fruits: Fruits are fantastic for strengthening immunity. One of the best is the orange. Remember the old saying, “an orange a day can keep the cold and flu away?” It is true. Oranges have a very high vitamin c content which of course strengthens immunity. Additional good fruit choices are kiwi, strawberries and papaya.

Turmeric: This fragrant spice is widely used in Asian cooking. Tumeric is a powerful cold and flu fighter due to the curcumin compound that it contains. It is also an anti-inflammatory and will boost your immunity. There are many ways to use turmeric. Adding to recipes such as rice dishes and seafood is a delicious way to experience this spice. Oregano: Oregano, is very helpful to fighting colds and flus and protecting the immune system. This delicious herb can enhance many dishes such as pastas and soups.

Seafood: Fish is very heart healthy and immune supporting due to the high levels of omega 3. Mostly known for their heart-healthy properties, Omega 3 fatty acids also boost the immune system. Trout, tuna and salmon are excellent choices.

Green Tea: Numerous studies have shown that the antioxidant polyphenols in green tea help to fortify the immune system. A delicious cup of green tea can keep the flu and cold bug away.

Supplements that boost immunity: The number one supplement is Vitamin C. The body produces more white blood cells which are infection fighting cells, when it has enough vitamin c. There are many ways to consume vitamin c including of course, eating a variety of fruits and vegetables. You can supplement with as little as 200 mg per day and receive great health benefits. In addition to its antioxidant power, vitamin c also reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease by elevating the good cholesterol or “hdl”. Studies have shown that people who consume sufficient amounts of this vitamin have lower rates of prostate and breast cancer. You can consume 200 mg per day with 6 servings of fruits and vegetables.

Vitamin E: The importance of vitamin E to health cannot be underestimated. This nutrient stimulates the body’s ability to increase the production of natural killer cells. These cells destroy viruses and cancer cells. Vitamin E also stimulates B-cell production that helps to destroy various bacteria in the body. You may be able to easily consume 30 milligrams daily through your foods. You can consider supplementing to intake approximately 100 milligrams daily.

Additional Supplements: Zinc increases white blood cell production and therefore boosts the immune system. It is much safer to get zinc from your diet rather than supplementing as too much can actually inhibit immunity. Aim for 15-25 milligrams daily. The best food sources include zinc fortified cereals, beef, turkey, oysters and beans. Three ounces of beef contains 6 milligrams of zinc. As with any supplementation, always consult with your medical doctor before taking, particularly if you suffer from any health conditions or are taking prescription medications.

The Issels Medical Center in Santa Barbara, California is a world renowned alternative cancer treatment center. The Issels Treatment is an Integrative Immunotherapy program with a 50 year history. Founded in 1951 by a pioneer in integrative cancer medicine, Dr. Josef Issels, MD., a German oncologist, The Issels Medical Center in Santa Barbara, California treats patients with all natural non toxic therapies for a variety of health conditions including cancer.

If you would like more information regarding the treatments available at The Issels Medical Center in Santa Barbara, California, please call 805-962-2126 or toll free at 888-374-7735. And please visit the website at: http://www.issels.com/Questionaire/questionnaire_IMC.aspx.

By Tina C. Loren