Grace’s Blog

Keeping your heart healthy and strong can lower your risk for heart disease.  It is not that difficult if you follow some guidelines.

Losing weight is one.  Two thirds of Americans are overweight or obese.  Could losing weight really help the heart?  The answer is YES!

According to a recent study published in the American Journal of Physiology you can improve the way your heart functions by just losing 12% of your weight, either by diet and exercise or both.

You can have a more youthful heart by dropping some of those excess pounds if you are overweight.

As we age the arteries and heart muscles stiffen and the heart doesn’t relax like it did when we were younger.

The study showed that by losing weight, the participants gained the ability of the heart to relax more quickly, recovering some of the elasticity characteristics of a younger heart.

The heart actually became younger!

Besides exercising and losing weight, here are some other things you can do to have a healthier heart.

Eat more fiber.  A study done by Harvard University, showed that men who ate at least 25 grams of fiber a day had one-third less heart attacks then men eating 12 grams or less a day.

Eat beans.  They contain a lot of good fiber that helps prevent heart disease by lowering cholesterol.  Eating a cup of beans a day can lower cholesterol by 10- 20 percent.

Eating garlic can lower cholesterol and help decrease the risk of heart disease.

A Harvard report found that women eating 1 ounce of almonds daily had a 40 percent lower risk of fatal heart disease. 

Almonds contain vitamin E and research at England’s Cambridge University found that by taking 400 IU of vitamin E for 18 months slashed nonfatal heart attacks in cardiovascular patients by 77 percent.

Vitamin C keeps blood vessels dilated. Without vitamin C, blood vessels constrict, shutting down blood flow. 

Two thousand mg’s a day dramatically restored dilation of blood vessels in heart attack patients, a Boston University study found.

Low levels of B vitamins, especially folic acid, are a heart disease precursor. 

Make sure to get plenty in your diet.  B’s are fragile and are easily destroyed by heat. 

When supplementing, use a high quality B-Vitamin supplement containing at least 100% DV of all 8 B’s.

Eat fish, lots of fish. If eating fish is not your thing, supplement with a high quality Omega-3 supplement. 

Omega-3’s thin the blood, decrease clot formation, raise HDL cholesterol and control irregular heart beats.

Every cell in the body needs Coenzyme Q10 for energy.  A healthy heart needs lots of it.  If a person is on a cholesterol lowering drug, it could deplete this important enzyme. 

Of adults age 40 and older, as many as 42% could be classified as being at an increased risk for heart disease. 

One in every four men die of heart disease and stroke, and one of every 2.5 women die of heart disease and stroke.

Maintaining a healthy heart is critically important.

 Shaklee Independent Distributor

Grace Health B-Vitamins, Cholesterol, CoEnzyme Q10, Diet, Exercise, Fiber, Garlic, heart attack, Heart Disease, Losing Weight, Omega-3, Vitamin C, Vitamin E

The anti-aging promise of resveratrol is real.

The amount or resveratrol in most products on the market do not come close to the amounts used in research.

Resveratrol is considered key in protecting the body against heart disease, cancer and neurological diseases, according to Dr. Joseph Maroon, a neuroscience professor at the University of Pittsburg School of Medicine.

According to him, it can prevent some infections, serve as an antiviral, reduce obesity, protect against some forms of diabetes and slow the effects of aging.

Resveratrol companies can refer to the mountains of published research, but what research has been done on THEIR resveratrol product and what are the findings? 

Not all resveratrol products are created equally.

Learn about the quality resveratrol product we use and love by logging on to our WEB SITE.

The Shaklee Difference VIDEO.

Shaklee Independent Distributor

Grace Anti-aging, Health Anti-aging, Heart Disease, Neurological Disease, resveratrol

An Aspirin a day has been a recommendation to reduce the risk of a heart attack for so many years that it is often repeated in the media and self-help books and web sites.  There are many people who have taken it upon themselves to take a baby aspirin everyday even though their doctor has not recommended it.

I have a niece who does it.  Maybe you know someone who also does it.  Maybe you even do it.

Is this a good thing to do?  Maybe not.

According to a new study done by Dr. Gerry Fowlkes of the Wolfson Unit for Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease in Edinburgh Scotland, this may not be good advice.

Dr. Fowlkes recently presented a study to the European Society for Cardiology in Barcelona Spain in which he described how he and his colleagues followed 3,000 men at a very high risk for developing heart disease for an average of eight years.

The group was divided in half and randomly assigned to take either an aspirin every day or a placebo.

There was no difference between the two groups in the rate of heart attacks or stroke, or risk of death from any cause after eight years.

There were no discernable health benefits for taking an aspirin a day.

 There were 34 major bleeds in people taking the aspirin and only 20 in the placebo group.  Looking at the internal bleeding so serious it required hospitalization, the risk was almost double for the aspirin users compared to the placebo users.

For otherwise healthy individuals the risk of taking aspirin outweighs the benefits.

If you have already had a heart attack, scientists cautioned that the benefits of taking aspirin might outweigh the risks.

Investigate natural alternatives rather than rely on a drug to reduce your risk of heart disease.  Clinical studies have shown that as little as 500 mg/day of omega-3 fatty acids, from fish or supplements, can reduce the risk of a second heart attack in someone who has already had one heart attack by 30-40%.

The Landmark Study  showed that people who have used Shaklee supplements for 20 years or more have 1/3 the incidence of angina, heart attack, stroke or congestive heart failure as do people using other company’s multivitamins or no supplements at all.

Shaklee Distributor

Grace Health Aspirin, cardiovascular disease, heart attack, Heart Disease, Landmark Study, omega-3 fatty acids

Genetic regulator Nrf2, pronounced Nerf 2, is a key genetic regulator of longevity.

Results of a randomized, placebo controlled clinical study by scientists at State University of New York at Buffalo using Shaklee’s Vivix will soon be published.

This was an independent study.  Shaklee did not do it.

When we are young and eat a high fat, high carbohydrate, low protein meal, it triggers an increase in Nrf2. This in turn increases production of our body’s own antioxidant defense mechanisms.

What does Nrf2 do?

Besides increasing the production of antioxidant defense mechanisms, it triggers our detoxification mechanisms and gets rid of all the artificial food additives and preservatives.

It triggers our immune balance mechanisms and anti-stress mechanisms. High fat meals depress the immune system and can cause inflammatory and autoimmune responses.

These mechanisms slow down cellular aging and reduce the risk of degenerative diseases.

As we get older, Nrf2 responses are no longer triggered by all the high fat bad foods we eat and we lose our natural protective mechanisms.

When that happens, we are more at risk for heart disease and stroke because our arteries are clogged from all those high fat meals.

Enter Shaklee’s Vivix.  The clinical study took a group of volunteers who consumed a 910 calorie breakfast at a well known fast food restaurant.  Half took Vivix immediately after breakfast and the other group took a placebo.

In those that took the Vivix, the Nrf2 increased dramatically within the first 3 hours after the meal.

The other group who took the placebo had their Nrf2 levels actually decline.

What does this mean?  A dose of Vivix containing resveratrol and ellagic acid has beneficial polyphenols that get into the bloodstream and have their intended anti-aging benefits.

Vivix will be even more effective when used with a good diet.  Vivix turns on Nrf2 whether you eat a bad diet or not.  Keep your system working at tip top shape with Vivix and make better choices in the foods you eat.

Click HERE to learn more about Vivix, a remarkable anti-aging tonic.  There is nothing like it anywhere.  It is backed by multiple patents and a soon to be published peer-reviewed clinical study.  Increasing Nrf2 is only one of the benefits.  When published, we will know more of all the benefits of using Vivix.

 Shaklee Independent Distributor

Grace Anti-aging, Health Anti-aging, Antioxidant, Cellular Aging, Clinical Study, Detoxification, Food Additives, Genetic Regulators, Heart Disease, immune system, Longevity, Nrf2, Polyphenols, resveratrol, Stroke, Vivix

How important is your heart?  I think you would agree, it is extremely important.  Without it, you wouldn’t be here.

Most people know the importance of taking care of their heart, but doing so sometimes proves to be difficult.

Heart disease is one of the major killers of our time. It is affected by diet, genetics, lifestyle, smoking and a bunch of other factors.

Our hearts beat day in and day out without us taking much notice until something goes wrong.  Then it is usually an emergency.

One substance that is critical to the heart is CoEnzyme Q 10 or CoQ10.  It is responsible for producing energy in the cells.  That includes the cells of the heart and other organs.

If there ever was a need for energy, I think the heart would qualify.  In clinical studies, researchers found that CoQ10 promotes the heart’s ability to pump blood.

The body is a magnificent creature.  It is able to synthesize many of the essentials needed for a healthy life, including CoQ10 which is found in every cell in the body.

Unfortunately, CoQ10 peaks in the human body around 20 years of age and goes down from there.

There are also medications that decrease the body’s CoQ10.  Statin drugs, which are given to heart patients, decrease CoQ10. 

This doesn’t make much sense to me. On the one hand, Doctors want to help the heart patient and on the other prescribe a medication that depletes the nutrient the heart needs to stay strong.

Unless a patient knows this side effect and supplements appropriately, the heart will continue to get weaker.

Unfortunately, most supplemental CoQ10 is poorly absorbed by the body. Finding a high quality bioavailable supplement is essential.

It is estimated that about 60% of the population in their fifties and sixties are deficient in CoQ10.

Learn more about CoQ10 and the choice you can make to supplement.

Shaklee Dist.

Grace Health, Human Body CoEnzyme Q10, Heart Disease