5 Day Shaklee 180 Mini Cleanse and Reset Program

                 5 Day Shaklee 180 Mini Cleanse and Reset Program



Breakfast:

5 Alfalfa
1 Liver DTX
2 B Vitamins
Shaklee 180 Smoothie
Lemon Water All Day 


Snack:

Unlimited Fresh Raw Fruit and Vegetables 


Lunch:

Shaklee 180 Smoothie
Unlimited Fresh Raw Fruit and Vegetables 


Snack:
 
Unlimited Fresh Raw Vegetables


Dinner:

Shaklee 180 Smoothie
Huge Salad made with 3 to 4 (or more) Raw Vegetables
5 Alfalfa
2 Liver DTX
2 HerbLax
2 B Vitamin

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The Best Way to Buy Shaklee Online

          The Best Way to Buy Shaklee Online

• Green Ways to $ave

Shaklee offers special promotions when you become a member on this website.  Contact HealthySupplies.Net with any questions or for more details. 
Want to S-A-V-E even more $$?  Get an immediate 15% discount on your purchases and all future purchases. No renewal fees on membership or Distributorship and No Minimum Orders.  JUST ORDER WHAT YOU WANT AND WHEN YOU WANT.  NO FUSS ~ JUST BENEFITS!!  
Become a Shaklee Member to receive wholesale prices (15%) off all your Shaklee purchases purchasing what you want and when you want it. 
Three Great WAYS TO SAVE MONEY!!!1) To automatically save 15% off everything Shaklee offers: Join as a Shaklee Member for just $19.95 (you may also join Shaklee during the checkout process).
Joining Shaklee is like joining Sam's Club or Costco & getting wholesale prices. Click on the Member Benefits Tab on the top of any page to see the all of the benefits of Shaklee membership.
** IMPORTANT** Joining as a member through HealthySupplies.Net means you'll also receive additional money-saving product specials throughout the year. You'll have access to a Members Only website with a Shaklee online reference library, and all the latest Shaklee news & promotions.

2) Welcome others to ShakleeShare the benefits of Shaklee membership with others and qualify for our Affiliate program. Contact HealthySupplies.Net for more details.

3) SAVE ON SHIPPING!
Shopping online already saves you money. Orders up to 2 pounds are $7.50 to ship & shipping on orders up to 10 pounds is $9.00. After that it's 85 cents/lb. It costs the same to ship 1 bottle of vitamins or several bottles. Stocking up now saves you time and money in the long run.

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Health Benefits of Red Wine vs. Grape Juice

  

We keep hearing about the benefits of drinking red wine. Why not grape juice instead? It has the same benefits, plus no alcohol.

 

Red wine is probably better for you than grape juice because the fermentation process involved in making wine changes the makeup of the juice, and the skin of the grape, which is loaded with healthful antioxidants, is more likely to be used in the winemaking process, said Dr. Antonia Trichopoulou, a professor and director of the World Health Organization Collaborating Center for Nutrition at the University of Athens School of Medicine in Greece. 

The color of the wine indicates how many healthful nutrients known as polyphenols the drink contains. “Red has more than white, and white more than beer,” said Dr. Miguel Ángel Martínez González of the University of Navarra in Spain. Red wine also contains alcohol, and many observational studies have shown that drinking alcoholic beverages in moderation reduces the risk of coronary heart disease, he said, by increasing levels of healthy HDL cholesterol and reducing the clumping of platelets that can lead to clots inside blood vessels.

A compound that may be responsible in part for wine’s health benefits, called resveratrol, is also present in grape juice. But it’s almost impossible to tell how much there is in a particular glass of wine or grape juice, and naturally occurring levels of resveratrol may be too low to have a pronounced effect on health, said Leonard Guarente, who studies the biology of aging at M.I.T. 

“There’s a tremendous variability in the amount of resveratrol even from one wine type and one batch to another,” said Dr. Guarente, who started a company that sells supplements that contain a resveratrol cousin.

Grape juice is also high in sugar, and people tend to drink a lot of it, which could be unhealthy, said Sara Baer-Sinnott, president of Oldways, a nutrition organization that advocates eating the Mediterranean diet.

“Grape juice is a good thing in moderation,” she said, remembering that when she was a child she used to drink it in tiny Dixie cups.

The bottom line, Dr. Guarente said, is that there is plenty of scientific research linking red wine to health benefits, but no similar studies in grape juice. “There may be some synergy between resveratrol and something else present in the wine and not in the grape juice,” he said.

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New Optimism on Resveratrol

New Optimism on Resveratrol
 By NICHOLAS WADE

Published: March 12, 2013

 

A cloud has long hung over the intriguing thesis that resveratrol, a minor ingredient of red wine, activates cellular proteins known as sirtuins that promote longer life in laboratory worms, flies and mice.

Critics have suggested that there were errors in the original experiments and that resveratrol did not in fact activate sirtuins directly. If so, resveratrol would lose much of its scientific interest because its link to the sirtuin would be unclear. But a new study led by David Sinclair of the Harvard Medical School, who in 2003 was a discoverer of resveratrol’s role in activating sirtuins, found that resveratrol did indeed influence sirtuin directly, though in a more complicated way than previously thought. Resveratrol appears to work by changing the shape of the sirtuin proteins in a cell. Thus activated, the sirtuins do several things, one of which is to switch on a second protein that spurs production of the mitochondria, which provide the cell’s energy. This would explain why mice treated with resveratrol ran twice as far on a treadmill before collapsing from exhaustion as untreated mice.

The exact knowledge of resveratrol’s mode of action, if confirmed, is welcome news for Sirtris, the company Dr. Sinclair helped found to explore whether resveratrol-mimicking drugs could avert the diseases of aging. Resveratrol itself is not ideal as a drug, for technical and patent reasons.

This is a more complete version of the story than the one that appeared in print. 

 

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Which Products of Shaklee are NON-GMO?

                    Which Products of Shaklee are NON-GMO?



Hello,

Do you have in information on what products from Shaklee are NON GMO --
obviously I know the soy protein is but what about the supplements?

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
--
Holly O'Leary

 ______________________________________________________________________________

 Thanks for your inquiry regarding Shaklee nutritional products and non-GMO ingredients.

While it is possible to guarantee non-GMO status for a primary ingredient such as soy, it is difficult, if not impossible, to make the same guarantee for multi-ingredient dietary supplements.

For the most part, GMO technology is applied to commodity crops such as wheat, corn, and soy. Since GMO technology is not applied to herbals or minerals, the issue of GMO with these ingredients is moot. The same goes for wheat, which we do not use in any of our dietary supplements. As for
corn, there are virtually no reliable sources of certified non-GMO corn as this crop has been using genetically modified seed for decades. 

While a number of supporting ingredients are sourced from corn, corn is not a primary ingredient in any of our products, as is soy, and the amount of any corn-sourced ingredient in a Shaklee supplements is comparatively low.

Your Friends at Shaklee

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The Right Thing to Do

The Right Thing to Do

Roger Barnett is CEO of Shaklee, a nutrition and personal care products company founded in 1956 on the principle, “follow the laws of nature and you’ll never go wrong.” Shaklee was one of the first companies to remove water-polluting phosphates from its cleaning products and became the first carbon neutral certified company in the world in 2000. Barnett spoke to Momentum and Terry Waghorn of Forbes recently about Shaklee’s role as a sustainability innovator.

Q: You have said you want Shaklee to be the first corporation to win a Nobel Peace Prize – for eradicating child malnutrition. Tell us about that.

My goal is for Shaklee to be the first company to solely win the Nobel Peace Prize. In 2004 Wangari Maathai won it for the Green Belt movement, which paid people 8 cents per tree to plant trees and as a result planted 30 million trees and helped people take control of their lives using financial incentives to improve the environment. In 2006 Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank won it for microloans, which help create sustainability. Without income or sustainability you can’t have the basis for peace. The third layer is health. From my perspective, because Shaklee is about health and also provides income opportunities to people at scale―in the millions―and also is about sustainability products, that would be the natural next step, to look at someone contributing to health and income and sustainability at the same time.

Q: Health is the foundation of Shaklee. Preventable chronic disease is at an all-time high in North America, yet science is better than ever. What factors are causing this scenario?

I think there is a growing awareness for prevention to be a salvational principle for our health care system here in North America and around the rest of the world. Economic pressures are going to force that as health care costs continue to escalate and if left unchanged will become too great a burden on our country. So the bottom line will drive a very positive outcome―a focus on lifestyle and nutrition that will allow people to live more active, productive lives for longer. And it is my great hope that Shaklee can help be an agent of change by sharing and educating people about prevention.

Q: Why did Shaklee choose to become carbon neutral?

Shaklee was founded on the principle of living in harmony with nature in 1956. Each and every decade the company has tried to make that founding principle real, tangible and relevant. So in the ’60s we were the first to take phosphates out of laundry detergent and dishwasher detergent. Then we pioneered the idea of super concentration―as a result, in just the past few years, we’ve saved enough plastic bottles that if you laid them end to end they would go around the Earth more than 29 times. In the ’80s we sponsored expeditions to the North Pole to measure the impact of climate change. In the ’90s we planted a million trees. In 2000 we wanted to show leadership for this decade, so we became the first company in the world to be Climate Neutral certified so as to leave no footprint on this planet. In order to do that we had to first help create a certification organization, then measure and quantify our carbon emissions. Then we went to local cities and created our own offset projects. We thought that, leading the way in becoming carbon neutral, we could get our corporate brothers and sisters to follow. We’re not the biggest company in the world, but we think we can lead by example.

We just did it because it was the right thing to do. But one of the interesting things is that we sort of measured the extra loyalty factor that we think accrues to Shaklee as a result of being a mission-oriented company. Our average tenure of distributor is 11 years. Our average customer has four to five times the retention rate of other companies in our industry. We attribute a lot of that to our values. Therefore, we feel in retrospect that there has actually been a very big economic benefit as a result of doing things for the right reasons.

Q: What do you say to people who contend you can’t be green and be profitable?

I’m hoping that argument is starting to disappear. When we look at our business and the incremental loyalty we attribute to being a mission-driven company, we believe that we have generated an extra $1 billion of sales over the lifetime of our company. I also think a lot of companies are realizing that the analysis of measuring carbon inputs and outputs has resulted in a significant reduction in the costs in the system.

I also believe being sustainable and green is increasingly becoming the ante of being in the business. It is not sufficient to be green; if the product doesn’t work as well, then you’re out of business. And I don’t believe consumers are willing to pay a premium for it. However, I believe that a green product with the same price and performance will always win against a non green product. At least in our case, it’s been a huge benefit to our bottom line.
Q: What’s next?

We have a continuous cycle of innovation. Our next general big push from product innovation will try to address the preventable side of where we are on the product health front―rising costs and rising health factors like obesity and diabetes. We’re trying to help people avoid that by being leaner and healthier. The flip side is that there is under nutrition, something which in our society should not exist. Unlike cancer or other kinds of disease where we don’t have the cure, we have the technology to deliver micro- and macronutrients on a very affordable basis at scale.

In the developing world, I think the Shaklee distribution model can solve the “last mile of distribution” problem to move this from a clinic-based model to a Social Marketing™ based model. It provides income and financial incentives for people to go educate others and therefore learn themselves. Scaling up that model is where I hope Shaklee can play a role over the next decade.

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Keep Watering Your Bamboo Tree

Keep Watering Your Bamboo Tree  

Eric Aronson
In the Far East, there is a tree called the Chinese bamboo tree. This remarkable tree is different from most trees in that it doesn't grow in the usual fashion. While most trees grow steadily over a period of years, the Chinese bamboo tree doesn't break through the ground for the first four years. 

Then, in the fifth year, an amazing thing happens - the tree begins to grow at an astonishing rate. In fact, in a period of just five weeks, a Chinese bamboo tree can grow to a height of 90 feet. It's almost as if you can actually see the tree growing before your very eyes. It is a colony plant, so it uses energy from this existing plant to produce more plants the next year, increasing the size of the colony. The new plants will grow in the same manner, only faster!

Well, I'm convinced that life often works in a similar way. You can work for weeks, months and years on your dream with no visible signs of progress and then, all of the sudden, things take off. Your business becomes profitable beyond your wildest dreams.

Your marriage becomes more vibrant and passionate than you ever thought it could be. Your contribution to your church, social organization and community becomes more significant than you have ever imagined.

Or

YOUR SHAKLEE DREAM!!!

Yet, all of this requires one thing - faith. The growers of the Chinese bamboo tree have faith that if they keep watering and fertilizing the ground, the tree will break through. Well, you must have the same kind of faith in your bamboo tree, whether it is to run a successful business, win a Pulitzer Prize, raise well-adjusted children, or other important endeavors and business you have been nurturing..

Or this Shaklee Investment!!! You must have faith that if you keep making the calls, honing your craft, reading to your kids, reaching out to your client base, that you too will see rapid growth in the future.

This is the hard part for most of us. We get so excited about the idea that's firmly planted inside of us that we simply can't wait for it to blossom. Therefore, within days or weeks of the initial planting, we can become discouraged and begin to second guess ourselves or outside influence can slow or impair our dream.

Sometimes, in our doubt, we dig up our seed and plant it elsewhere, in hopes that it will quickly rise in more fertile ground. We see this very often in people who change jobs every year or so. We also see it in people who change churches, organizations and even spouses in the pursuit of greener pastures. More often than not, these people are greatly disappointed when their tree doesn't grow any faster in the new location.

Other times, people will water the ground for a time but then, quickly become discouraged. They may even start to wonder if it's worth all of the effort. This is particularly true when they see their neighbors having success with other trees. They start to think, "What am I doing trying to grow a "bamboo" tree? If I had planted a lemon tree, I'd have a few lemons by now." These are the kind of people who return to their old jobs and their old ways. They walk away or abandon their bamboo dream in exchange for a more common "sure thing."

Sadly, what many people fail to realize is that pursuing your dream will be a "sure thing" if you never give up. So long as you keep watering and cultivating your dream, it will come to fruition. It may take weeks, months, years or even much of a lifetime, but eventually, the roots will take hold and your tree will grow. And when it does, it will grow in remarkable ways.
We've seen this happen so many times. Henry Ford had to water his bamboo tree through five business failures before he finally succeeded with the Ford Motor Company.

Richard Hooker had to water his bamboo tree for seven years and through 21 rejections by publishers until his humorous war novel, M*A*S*H became a runaway bestseller, spawning a movie and one of the longest-running television series of all-time.

Another great bamboo grower was the legendary jockey Eddie Arcaro. Arcaro lost his first 250 races as a jockey before going on to win 17 Triple Crown races and 554 stakes races for total purse earnings of more than $30 million. 

Now after years of hard work by many, we are starting to realize the manifestation of our Shaklee  dream.  2012 is our year, - our bamboo tree is sprouting. What a gorgeous sight it will be.

 Remember, we all have a bamboo tree inside of us just waiting to break through.  Keep watering and believing and you too can be flying high before you know it.

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In the Cancer Fight, Eating Well is the Best Revenge

In the Cancer Fight, Eating Well is the Best Revenge

April 15, 2007

LOS ANGELES - We all know that eating fruits, vegetables and soy products provides essential nutrition for a healthy lifestyle, while obesity leads to the opposite. Yet proving the effect of nutrition, or obesity, on cancer is an experimental challenge and a focus for scientists. According to emerging evidence being presented at the 2007 Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research, eating well might still be one of the more pleasurable ways to prevent cancer and promote good health.

A novel mechanism for the chemoprotection by 3,3-diindolylmethane (DIM) and genistein for breast and ovarian cancer: Abstract 4217

Eating such foods as broccoli and soy are believed to offer some protection against cancer, but how this occurs is not well-understood. Now, in laboratory experiments, researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, have discovered a biological mechanism whereby two compounds in these foods might lower the invasive and metastatic potential of breast and ovarian cancer cells.

They found that diindolylmethane (DIM), a compound resulting from digestion of cruciferous vegetables, and genistein, a major isoflavone in soy, reduce production of two proteins whose chemotactic attraction to each other is necessary for the spread of breast and ovarian cancers.

When applying purified versions of DIM and genistein to motile cancer cells, the researchers could literally watch these cells come to a near halt. When either compound was applied, migration and invasion were substantially reduced.

"We think these compounds might slow or prevent the metastasis of breast and ovarian cancer, which would greatly increase the effectiveness of current treatments," said Erin Hsu, a graduate student in molecular toxicology. "But we need to test that notion in animals before we can be more definitive."

Both DIM and genistein are already being developed for use as a preventive and a chemotherapy treatment for breast cancer, although more extensive toxicological studies are necessary, the researchers say.

The researchers looked at the potential of DIM and genistein to interfere with the "CXCR4/CXCL12 axis," which is known to play a central role in the metastasis of breast cancer and is also thought to play a role in the development of ovarian cancer. Primary cancer cells express very high levels of the CXCR4 chemokine receptor on the surface of their cells, and the organs to which these cancers metastasize secrete high levels of the CXCL12 chemokine ligand. This attraction stimulates the invasive properties of cancer cells and acts like a homing device, drawing the cancer cells to the organs they metastasize to.

When breast and ovarian cancer cell lines are exposed to purified DIM or genistein, levels of CXCR4 and CXCL12 messenger RNAs and proteins decrease in a dose-dependent manner, compared to untreated cells, according to Hsu.

To assess whether the compounds had any effect on the metastatic potential of the cells, the researchers placed the cells in one end of a compartment and watched how they moved toward CXCL12 at the other end. "The cells degrade the extracellular matrix in the upper compartment in order to move toward CXCL12 in the lower compartment, a system that represents a cell culture model for invasiveness," she said.

But if the cells are treated with either DIM or genistein, movement toward CXCL12 is reduced by at least 80 percent compared to untreated cells, the researchers say.

Hsu says that this same chemotactic attraction is thought to play a role in the development of more than 23 different types of cancer, and, so far, they have found that messenger RNA expression of CXCR4 and CXCL12 is substantially reduced when melanoma and prostate cancer cells are treated with the two compounds.

"We have also tested other phytochemicals and seen similar effects, indicating that this mechanism may mediate protective effects of other vegetable products as well," Hsu said.

The amount of DIM and genistein used in this study is probably comparable to use of a high dose of supplements, and is likely not achievable through consumption of food alone, the researchers say.

Flavonols and pancreatic cancer risk: The Multiethnic Cohort Study: Abstract 856

A study of food consumption in 183,518 residents of California and Hawaii has found that a diet high in flavonols might help reduce pancreatic cancer risk, especially in smokers. These compounds are generally ubiquitous in plant-based foods, but are found in highest concentrations in onions, apples, berries, kale and broccoli.

People who ate the largest amounts of flavonols had a 23 percent reduced risk of developing pancreatic cancer compared to those who ate the least, according to a research team led by Laurence Kolonel, M.D., Ph.D., at the Cancer Research Center of Hawaii.

Smokers gained the most benefit. Those who ate the most flavonols reduced their risk of developing pancreatic cancer by 59 percent, compared to those who ate the least, says the study's lead author, Ute Nöthlings, DrPH, who conducted the study as a postdoctoral fellow in Hawaii and is now a researcher at the German Institute of Human Nutrition Potsdam-Rehbruecke.

"The effect was largest in smokers, presumably because they are at increased pancreatic cancer risk already," said Nöthlings. Smoking is the only established risk factor for pancreatic cancer, and "short of stopping tobacco use, it has been difficult to consistently show lifestyle factors that might help protect against this deadly cancer," she says.

As part of a larger research project known as The Multiethnic Cohort Study, Kolonel and Nöthlings followed the participants for an average of eight years after they filled out a comprehensive food questionnaire.

Although Nöthlings says the study has a large statistical power because of the large number of pancreatic cancer cases (529) that occurred in the study population, she says that this one study cannot firmly answer the question of whether flavonols can prevent development of pancreatic cancer. "Further epidemiological studies in other populations and geographic regions are needed to confirm our findings," she said.

The study also is the first to examine prospectively specific classes of flavonols and pancreatic cancer risk.

The researchers looked at consumption of three flavonols: quercetin, which is most abundant in onions and apples; kaempferol, found in spinach and some cabbages; and myricetin, found mostly in red onions and berries.

Of the three individual flavonols, kaempferol was associated with the largest risk reduction (22 percent) across all participants. When the researchers divided intake into quartiles, and then compared highest intake to lowest, all the three classes of flavonols were associated with a significant trend toward reduced pancreatic cancer risk in current smokers, but not in never or former smokers. The interaction with smoking status was statistically significant for total flavonols, quercetin and kaempferol.

The researchers say their study did not examine the biological mechanisms by which these flavonols could exert a protective effect against pancreatic cancer. "But anti-carcinogenic effects of flavonoids in general have been attributed to the ability of these constituents to inhibit cell cycle, cell proliferation and oxidative stress, and to induce detoxification enzymes and apoptosis," Nöthlings said.

Polyp characteristics, diet, lifestyle factors and high-risk colorectal adenoma recurrence in the polyp prevention trial: Abstract 861

Experts agree that people who have had three or more potentially precancerous adenomatous polyps removed during a colonoscopy should be "rescoped" in three years to make sure the polyps do not recur. But now researchers at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) have identified other factors that independently raise the risk of recurrence.

Two of these risk factors - being over 65 years old, and male - cannot be modified, but the third - obesity - can, say the researchers.

The results can further help physicians stratify patients at greatest need for follow-up colonoscopies, they say, and can also inform patients about their own risk.

"In a situation where there are not enough physicians, or where doctors have long waiting lists for those who are not first-timers to a colon cancer check-up, then this risk stratification may help physicians prioritize which patients should be seen first," said Adeyinka Laiyemo, M.D., a cancer prevention fellow at NCI.

For patients, Dr. Laiyemo says that "it is important to follow your doctor's recommendation based on the nature of polyp removed during colonoscopy, and maintain a healthy weight. However, men should also recognize that they may be at a higher risk for developing worrisome polyps, and so should women who are over 65 years of age."

The researchers say the findings support the 2006 consensus guidelines, developed jointly by the U.S. Multi-Society Task Force on Colorectal Cancer and the American Cancer Society. These guidelines recommend that people with an advanced adenoma or three or more adenomatous polyps should undergo repeat colonoscopy in three years. The issue, according to the group, is that many patients were being rescoped earlier than recommended, and that these repeat colonoscopies constituted a significant portion of endoscopic practices, draining resources away from patients in need of first time screenings. Previous studies have found that a three-year interval was just as safe for people with three or more adenomatous polyps, high-grade dysplasia, or an adenoma one centimeter or larger in diameter.

This study was designed to see if these guidelines adequately identified patients who later developed dangerous polyps, and also sought to discover other factors associated with increased risk. The research team used data from participants in the Polyp Prevention Trial (PPT), which assessed the impact of a low-fat, high-fiber, high fruits and vegetables diet on polyp recurrence. They examined the diet, lifestyle, and polyp characteristics in 1,905 participants at baseline, after they had a colonoscopy in which at least one polyp was removed and before they altered their eating habits to conform to PPT rules.

Within four years, 230 PPT participants developed high-risk polyps, and 524 had a low-risk adenoma recurrence. Dr. Laiyemo and his team found that, indeed, the presence of multiple adenomas was the largest risk factor associated with polyp recurrence, but that age, gender and obesity played important, if lesser, roles in stratifying risk. Of these factors, age was the most statistically significant, followed by gender and then obesity, he reports.

The only statistically significant factor they found that lowered risk was use of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs).

"We know from previous studies that NSAIDs can reduce polyp formation, but perhaps at a cost, due to some side effects that have been observed," Dr. Laiyemo said. "We think that people should follow the consensus guidelines, but these other variables should also be considered when judging an individual's risk and the need for follow-up colonoscopies at the appropriate time."

Fruit and vegetable intake and head and neck cancer in a large United States prospective cohort study: Abstract 849

A new study among AARP members shows that just one additional serving of fruit and vegetables per day may lower your risk of head and neck cancer, but the data suggest that you may not want to stop at just one, according to researchers from the National Cancer Institute.

A large prospective study of 500,000 men and women aged 50 and older has found that those who ate more fruit and vegetables had a reduced risk of head and neck cancer. Head and neck cancer is the sixth leading cause of cancer-related mortality worldwide, resulting in more than 350,000 deaths annually.

"Identifying protective factors for head and neck cancer is particularly important as it has a high mortality rate," said Neal Freedman, Ph.D., cancer prevention fellow at the National Cancer Institute.

At the beginning of the study, participants reported their typical dietary habits on a food frequency questionnaire. Freedman and his colleagues followed participants for five years and recorded all diagnoses of head and neck cancer cases during this time.

In their findings, the researchers report that participants who ate six servings of fruit and vegetables per day per 1000 calories had 29 percent less risk for head and neck cancer than did participants who consumed one and a half servings per 1000 calories per day. Typically, adults consume approximately 2000 calories per day. One serving equals approximately one medium sized fresh fruit, one half cup of cut fruit, six ounces fruit juice, one cup leafy vegetables, or one half cup of other vegetables.

"Increasing consumption by just one serving of fruit or vegetables per 1000 calories per day was associated with a six percent reduction in head and neck cancer risk," Freedman said.

According to Freedman, people who ate a lot of fruit also tended to eat a lot of vegetables, and vice versa. To measure these two types of foods independently, the researchers included both fruit and vegetable intake in the statistical models, a common statistical approach. This allowed them to compare participants with different levels of fruit consumption while holding constant the level of vegetable intake and vice versa. When examining fruit and vegetable intake simultaneously, the protective association with vegetables seemed to be stronger than the association with fruits.

"Although we cannot absolutely rule out a cancer preventive role for other lifestyle factors that go along with eating more fruits and vegetables, our results are consistent with those from previous studies," Freedman said. "Our study suggests that fruit and vegetable consumption may protect against head and neck cancer and adds support to current dietary recommendations to increase fruit and vegetable consumption."

 

# # # #

The mission of the American Association for Cancer Research is to prevent and cure cancer. Founded in 1907, AACR is the world's oldest and largest professional organization dedicated to advancing cancer research. The membership includes more than 25,000 basic, translational, and clinical researchers; health care professionals; and cancer survivors and advocates in the United States and more than 70 other countries. AACR marshals the full spectrum of expertise from the cancer community to accelerate progress in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cancer through high-quality scientific and educational programs. It funds innovative, meritorious research grants. The AACR Annual Meeting attracts over 17,000 participants who share the latest discoveries and developments in the field. Special Conferences throughout the year present novel data across a wide variety of topics in cancer research, diagnosis and treatment. AACR publishes five major peer-reviewed journals: Cancer Research; Clinical Cancer Research; Molecular Cancer Therapeutics; Molecular Cancer Research; and Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention. Its most recent publication, CR, is a magazine for cancer survivors, patient advocates, their families, physicians, and scientists. It provides a forum for sharing essential, evidence-based information and perspectives on progress in cancer research, survivorship and advocacy. 

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Take Shaklee Supplements, Be Healthier

Take Shaklee Supplements, Be Healthier

We’ve known this for years, but now we have a landmark study—the first of its kind and the largest long-term supplement study conducted in history—to lend even more scientific support to this claim.

              The Landmark Shaklee Food Supplement Study (as we call it) was conducted by Dr. Gladys Block, head of the UC Berkeley School of Public Health and considered one of the top epidemiologists in the US. She and her team randomly selected 300 from more than 1000 people who had been using Shaklee supplements for at least 20 years (20 – 42 years, to be exact). Their health was assessed through questionnaires, a physical examination, and blood tests, then compared with the health of people who had supplemented for at least 20 years with non-Shaklee brand multi-vitamins, and also with people who had not supplemented at all for at least 20 years. Roger Barnett (President and CEO of Shaklee) told us at the global conference in August that when he walked in the room to hear the results of the study, Dr. Block was vibrating with excitement, saying, “These results are incredible!” Scientists are usually pretty calm people, so this must have been fun to see!

              Officially the study is named “Usage patterns, health, and nutritional status of long-term multiple dietary supplement users: a cross-sectional study.” It was published on October 24, 2007 in Nutrition Journal, a prestigious online peer-reviewed international scientific journal. The study in its entirety can be accessed at www.nutritionj.com/content/6/1/30.

          The understated, scientific language of the conclusion of the study says that the Shaklee supplement users “were more likely to have optimal concentrations of biomarkers associated with reduced disease risk, and less likely to have suboptimal circulating nutrient concentrations, elevated blood pressure, and diabetes, than multivitamin/mineral users and non-users.” The more general interpretation is that the group that supplemented with Shaklee had dramatically better health than those who did not.

          While Roger Barnett was in Boston for a Shaklee function, he met a man who worked at MIT. They talked about Shaklee and discussed how good Shaklee’s nutritional products were. The man suggested how a good clinical study could prove that point. Roger went back to California with his idea, contacted Dr. Gladys Block and the Landmark study was started. She was concerned over the media distortions of vitamin supplementation and wanted to do a long-term study to show the benefits and to overcome some of the flaws in the “bad” studies. She asked Shaklee to provide subjects for the study. While Shaklee did fund the study, the design and execution of the study and the conclusions drawn and published were under the control of Dr. Block from the start. While we who love Shaklee might wish the study talked a lot more about Shaklee specifically, this is a work of science, not advertising. The structure of the study is to compare people who took a bunch of Shaklee supplements to those who took just a multi to those who took none. Finding people who took just a Shaklee multi for 20 years (for a direct comparison) would be nearly impossible, because Shaklee customers tend to be better nutritionally educated (because their distributors provide good information) and therefore take more supplements.

          The study contains some pretty eye-opening information hidden within the scientific verbiage; we’ll take a look at some of that detail and pull the good stuff out into the light where we non-scientists can see it more clearly.

          The first, and most obvious, point is that the Shaklee group scored a healthier total on virtually every marker in the study—disease-related, nutrient-related, or general-health-related. There was absolutely no sign of any toxicity or “poisoning” from taking too many supplements—and this group took a lot of supplements. In addition, the Shaklee group was older than either of the other groups (almost 10 years older than the non-supplement group!), and it still scored better, including a lower Body Mass Index (BMI).

          The nutritional numbers (“serum nutrient concentrations”) were quite revealing. In every comparative category, the Shaklee users had better results than either of the other two groups—most of them statistically significant (big, meaningful differences, in other words). Interestingly, when ferritin (iron) was measured, the results were different between men and women. Women in general struggle with low iron—the Shaklee group had the highest measure at 117.4 (an optimal level). Men are more prone to elevated iron levels—the Shaklee group had the lowest measure at 117.6 (much lower than the other groups). So whichever gender was taking Shaklee supplements, whatever the tendency of that group, the score was right smack in the optimal range. And the one non-comparative measure in the study—Vitamin D—showed the Shaklee group right in the middle of the optimal range—and no single individual tested was outside the optimal range on either end.

          While the study doesn’t directly draw this conclusion, it’s clear that taking Shaklee supplements, even in relatively high quantities compared to the population at large (only 3 out of 11,000 individuals in the entire NHANES study, which was used for the comparative data, took supplements at the level of the Shaklee group) is not only safe, but it resulted in serum nutrient levels that are about as good as they can get.

                    The serum biomarker concentrations section compares a number of non-nutrient blood components that are directly tied to health and disease. Some of these measures are quite familiar (cholesterol, triglycerides), while others are less commonly known (homocysteine, C-reactive protein). Again, in every category, the Shaklee users had better numbers. And this particular section produced two very dramatic results (as though winning every category isn’t dramatic enough!).

          C-reactive protein (CRP) is a measure that is predictive of future cardiovascular disease risk (and has been strongly linked to the risk of developing certain cancers). In other words, the higher the level of CRP, the greater the risk of heart disease and some cancers. It’s one of those measures that you really want to be low in your bloodstream. Not only was the Shaklee group the only one that was within the optimal range (<.3), but not a single individual in the entire group was outside the optimal range. Let’s word that differently; while not one person in the Shaklee group had elevated levels of CRP, both of the other groups averaged in the elevated range. That would be almost beyond belief if we didn’t know how amazing Shaklee supplements are. Where do you want your CRP to be?

          Similarly, triglycerides are clearly linked to heart disease risk and metabolic syndrome. And similarly, not a single person in the Shaklee group had triglycerides over 150 (the top of the optimal range), while the Shaklee group as a whole averaged 121—really good. The non-supplement users averaged over 180!

          While perhaps not quite as dramatic, the measures of homocysteine (another important cardiovascular disease predictor) in the non-Shaklee groups were approximately 50% higher (a bad thing) than in the Shaklee group. And again, while the Shaklee group measured well inside the optimal range (6.1, optimal is <9), each of the other two groups’ average was above the optimal range.

          Obviously, health is far more complex than a few blood readings. But at the same time, each of these factors has been clearly and unmistakably linked to diseases that, let’s face it, you really don’t want. This study dramatically demonstrates that taking an array of Shaklee supplements significantly reduces the risk of incidence of these diseases.

          One of the very interesting findings concerned blood pressure. A positive link between serum nutrient levels and blood pressure has been shown in some studies (and not in others), but it has been difficult to show that any particular nutrient can reduce elevated blood pressure. In this study, the Shaklee group had “significantly lower” blood pressure than either of the other two groups, but the multi user group was not significantly lower than the non-user group. The authors speculate that Vitamins B and C (each of which has been studied individually, with mixed results, in relation to blood pressure, and each of which were present in optimal levels in the Shaklee group) together may have a synergistic effect—producing better results in combination than the sum of each of their individual benefits. Scientists really like single-variable studies—they produce much more verifiable and duplicable results and conclusions. But nutrition may be a more complex science that will require more complex studies to understand. It could be that having optimal levels of many nutrients really does produce better health than simply adding the proven benefits of individual nutrients together. This is one of those areas in which common sense would seem to be ahead of science, but in this study we see science perhaps catching up a bit.

          Finally, in the area of incidence of disease (the “rubber meets the road” area), dramatic results can be seen in several areas. In the cardiac-related group, which includes coronary heart disease, heart attack, angina, and congestive heart failure, the Shaklee group—not surprisingly, given the blood readings discussed above—showed lower incidence of each disease. And be reminded again, the Shaklee group is 10 years older than the non-user group and 6 years older than the multi group. The Shaklee group also showed a lower incidence of emphysema.

          Perhaps the most dramatic disease-related finding, however, was with diabetes. The non-user and multi-user groups had a 4-5 times higher incidence of diabetes than the Shaklee group—again, despite being younger. The study even posits that the comparatively high levels of multiple antioxidants found in the blood of the Shaklee group members could be a contributing factor to this finding.

          So not only does taking an array of Shaklee supplements reduce the risk of incidence of some pretty nasty diseases, it also demonstrably reduces actual incidence among this group of users.

          It must be noted that the designers of the study eliminated cancer from the study. Anyone with a history of cancer (other than non-melanoma skin cancer) was removed from consideration in the study (in all 3 groups), because cancer and cancer treatment alter blood chemistry in a way that would have skewed the results.

          And lastly, a measure of overall health that has been used in many studies and has been found to be a statistically accurate measure is self-assessed health status. In this study, the Shaklee group reported their health to be much better than either of the other groups, and there was little difference between those other two groups in their reporting. In other words, just taking a Brand X multi for 20 years did not result in a statistically significant difference in how people reported their health versus taking no supplements whatsoever.

          So what does is all mean? Well, a lot. This study is a very big deal. Conclusions in a scientific journal have to be proven by solid data and procedures. Conclusions in a wrap-up paragraph like this one follow a somewhat looser set of requirements. They can actually use common sense and logic instead of just data.

          First, the study shows very clearly that using a broad array of Shaklee supplements for at least 20 years produces some pretty dramatic health benefits—both in indicators as well as disease incidence. We’ve said for many years that you will pay for your health—whether it’s good health or bad health—so it makes more sense to pay for good health. With this study, it’s clear that paying for (and taking!) Shaklee supplements produce dramatic, positive impact on health. Now, the study results don’t mean that if you take Shaklee, you’re bulletproof. But they do indicate that if you take Shaklee, you’ll be better off than if you don’t. So now the question of “What is your health worth?”, becomes a more meaningful one, because there are clear results to pin to the cost of the supplements.

          Second, the study shows very clearly that taking a lot of Shaklee nutrients is a good thing for your health. We often run into fears about “overdosing” on vitamins in people (but strangely, we’ve never run into anyone afraid of “overdosing” on M&M’s or ice cream, which have virtually zero benefits and plenty of downside). The subjects in the Shaklee group took a lot of supplements, and the only results seem to be positive. There is NO indication of toxic effects, and there are LOTS of indications of substantial health benefits—some of which seem to be clearly tied to taking relatively large amounts of Shaklee nutrients. In other words, having enough of a broad array of Shaklee nutrients in your system, produces better health. It’s a simple equation. There may be (and likely are) limits beyond which there is diminishing effect, but this study gives no indication of where those limits may be.

          Is the fact that the multivitamin-only group used Brand X (an assumption, but logically true) and the multiple-supplement group used Shaklee products a significant factor? That’s a harder question to answer based just on the data. But the fact that Shaklee supplements are scientifically tested in over 100 clinical studies, are manufactured to pharmaceutical standards, are tested and tested and tested for purity, are naturally-sourced from better-than-organic raw materials (not from chemicals produced in a lab), are produced in a way that preserves the “life” of the nutrients (no high temperatures, harsh solvents, etc.), and are unconditionally guaranteed by a company with more than 55 years of experience—the #1 natural food supplement company in the country—all would lead one by common sense to answer, “YES!” And when you consider that the multivitamins consumed by the multi-only group were almost certainly synthetic (since the vast majority of multivitamins are synthetic), and that there are a number of measures in the study in which the no-supplement group actually had better readings than the multi-only group, it only adds weight to that answer.

          And finally, the study provides something that no other supplement manufacturer anywhere in the world has—proof that taking Shaklee supplements long-term provides substantial health benefits. No other company can make that claim and back it with evidence like this. If you want better health over the long run—from lower CRP and triglycerides and blood pressure to lower incidence of diabetes and heart disease; if you want to be able truthfully to report your health as very good or excellent; if you want to feel better—simply swallowing a few Shaklee supplements on a daily basis is a very easy—and a very effective—way to start.

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The Shaklee Difference - Part 1

The Shaklee Difference - Part 1 

 Dr. Stephen Chaney

A number of you have contacted me requesting a clear explanation of the Shaklee Difference.

I understand your frustration. I have looked at the literature and web sites of many of Shaklee's competitors.

Most of Shaklee's competitors excel in marketing. Their web sites and literature tell compelling stories. Every company claims to have the highest quality standards and products backed by outstanding science.

They all claim to be the best.

So what is it that truly distinguishes Shaklee from the rest?

In my opinion there are five things that make Shaklee stand out from the crowd.

#1) Integrity: To me integrity means three things:

- No hype or false claims. One reason why other companies are able to tell such compelling stories is that they feel free to make claims that they cannot back up with clinical studies (more about that next week).

Shaklee does not resort to hype or false claims in promoting their products. Shaklee has never been asked by the FTC or FDA to retract any of their product claims - something that cannot be said for many of their competitors.

- No testimonials. One reason why other company's web sites are so compelling is the testimonials.

In evaluating testimonials you need to understand that the placebo effect is close to 50% for things like pain relief, energy and feeling of well being.

That's why I always ignore testimonials unless they are backed by sound science.

- No paid endorsements. Endorsements are commodities. They are bought and sold.

That's why I always ignore endorsements by doctors and professional athletes.

So what is the bottom line for you as a consumer?

My recommendation is to pay very little attention to testimonials and endorsements.

And, of course, remember those venerable words of wisdom "If it sounds to good to be true, it probably isn't". Don't get caught up in the hype. Just use your common sense.

#2) The Golden Rule. I know that sounds kind of hokey, but by that I mean:

- Shaklee's commitment to only make products of proven benefit.

Some of you may remember earlier fads concerning chromium picolinate and colloidal minerals. The current fads seem to be magic water and exotic juices.

Shaklee has looked at all of those products. They could have made lots of money from marketing those kinds of products, but there was no good evidence that they actually worked - that they provided a real benefit to people using them. So Shaklee chose not to make those
products.

- Shaklee's commitment to only make products that will do no harm.

Some of you may remember those weight loss products containing ephedra (ma huang) from a few years ago.

Shaklee evaluated ephedra for their weight loss products. It is effective at increasing metabolic
rate, but it also causes arrhythmia - it kills people.

That was abundantly clear from the scientific literature at that time. Of course, Shaklee chose to not use ephedra in their weight loss products. But many of their competitors used it - until enough people died that the FDA stepped in and banned ephedra.

- Shaklee's commitment to make their products as natural as possible. We are exposed to too many toxic chemicals in the food we eat, the water we drink and the air we breathe. Because of that I prefer to avoid artificial ingredients in the supplements that I take.

I have seen the list of artificial ingredients that Shaklee will not use. It's the size of a small
telephone book.

And that list includes sucralose. While many experts will assure you that sucralose is safe, other experts aren't so sure.

My rule of thumb is to not knowingly consume any artificial ingredient unless it has been in the food supply for at least 20 years and is still considered safe.

If you think about it, we have been assured by the "experts" that other artificial ingredients were safe only to have the FDA announce years latter "Oops – we were wrong"

I prefer to avoid the "Oops" factor.

Shaklee's list of ingredients that they will never use also includes GMO ingredients. Again, this is a controversial area, but I believe that there are too many unresolved environmental and health concerns around GMO foods.

So what is the bottom line for you as a consumer?

It is difficult for the layperson to evaluate the efficacy and safety of an ingredient or product, but you can become a discerning label reader.

I would recommend avoiding supplements containing artificial colors, preservatives and sweeteners (including sucralose).

And for food products (shakes, bars and gels) I would also recommend avoiding them unless the label specifically states that they use non GMO ingredients.

Coming Next Week: The Shaklee Difference in product quality, clinical studies and, of course, the Landmark study.

To Your Health!
Dr. Stephen G Chaney

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Breastfeeding Linked to Healthy Infant Gut: Bacterial Colonization Leads to Changes in the Infant’s Expression of Genes

Science News

... from universities, journals, and other research organizations

Breastfeeding Linked to Healthy Infant Gut: Bacterial Colonization Leads to Changes in the Infant’s Expression of Genes

Apr. 29, 2012 — Early colonization of the gut by microbes in infants is critical for development of their intestinal tract and in immune development. A new study, published in BioMed Central’s open access journal Genome Biology, shows that differences in bacterial colonization of formula-fed and breast-fed babies leads to changes in the infant’s expression of genes involved in the immune system, and in defense against pathogens.

The health of individuals can be influenced by the diversity of microbes colonizing the gut, and microbial colonization can be especially important in regulating both intestinal and immune development in infants. However, little is known about the potential interactions between the host’s health at a molecular level, their gut microbes, and diet.

The human intestine is lined by epithelial cells that process nutrients and provide the first line of defense against food antigens and pathogens. Approximately one-sixth of intestinal epithelial cells are shed every day into feces, providing a non-invasive picture of what is going on inside the gut.

In this study, the authors used transcriptome analysis to compare the intestines of three month old exclusively breast-fed or formula-fed infants, and relate this to their gut microbes. Transcriptome analysis looks at the small percentage of the genetic code that is transcribed into RNA molecules and is a measure of what genes are actively making proteins. Concurrently the microbes (microbiome) were identified by genetic analysis.

The results showed that the breast-fed babies had a wider range of microbes in their gut than the formula-fed infants but that their immune systems had developed to cope.

Robert Chapkin from the Texas A&M University, who led this multi-centre study, explained,  “While we found that the microbiome of breast-fed infants is significantly enriched in genes associated with ‘virulence’,  including resistance to antibiotics and toxic compounds, we also found a correlation between  bacterial pathogenicity and the expression of host genes associated with immune and defense mechanisms.”

He continued, “Our findings suggest that human milk promotes the beneficial crosstalk between the immune system and microbe population in the gut, and maintains intestinal stability.”

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Gut Microbes Closely Linked to Proper Immune Function, Other Health Issues

Gut Microbes Closely Linked to Proper Immune Function, Other Health Issues

Sep. 16, 2013 — A new understanding of the essential role of gut microbes in the immune system may hold the key to dealing with some of the more significant health problems facing people in the world today, Oregon State University researchers say in a new analysis.

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Problems ranging from autoimmune disease to clinical depression and simple obesity may in fact be linked to immune dysfunction that begins with a "failure to communicate" in the human gut, the scientists say. Health care of the future may include personalized diagnosis of an individual's "microbiome" to determine what prebiotics or probiotics are needed to provide balance.

Appropriate sanitation such as clean water and sewers are good. But some erroneous lessons in health care may need to be unlearned -- leaving behind the fear of dirt, the love of antimicrobial cleansers, and the outdated notion that an antibiotic is always a good idea. We live in a world of "germs" and many of them are good for us.

"Asked about their immune system, most people might think of white blood cells, lymph glands or vaccines," said Dr. Natalia Shulzhenko, author of a new report in Clinical Reviews in Allergy and Immunology, and assistant professor and physician in the OSU Department of Biomedical Sciences. "They would be surprised that's not where most of the action is. Our intestines contain more immune cells than the entire rest of our body.

"The human gut plays a huge role in immune function," Shulzhenko said. "This is little appreciated by people who think its only role is digestion. The combined number of genes in the microbiota genome is 150 times larger than the person in which they reside. They do help us digest food, but they do a lot more than that."

An emerging theory of disease, Shulzhenko said, is a disruption in the "crosstalk" between the microbes in the human gut and other cells involved in the immune system and metabolic processes.

"In a healthy person, these microbes in the gut stimulate the immune system as needed, and it in turn talks back," Shulzhenko said. "There's an increasing disruption of these microbes from modern lifestyle, diet, overuse of antibiotics and other issues. With that disruption, the conversation is breaking down."

An explosion of research in the field of genomic sequencing is for the first time allowing researchers to understand some of this conversation and appreciate its significance, Shulzhenko said. The results are surprising, with links that lead to a range of diseases, including celiac disease and inflammatory bowel disease. Obesity may be related. And some studies have found relevance to depression, late-onset autism, allergies, asthma and cancer.

In the new review, researchers analyzed how microbe dysfunction can sometimes result in malabsorption and diarrhea, which affects tens of millions of children worldwide and is often not cured merely by better nutrition. In contrast, a high-fat diet may cause the gut microbes to quickly adapt to and prefer these foods, leading to increased lipid absorption and weight gain.

The chronic inflammation linked to most of the diseases that kill people in the developed world today -- heart disease, cancer, diabetes -- may begin with dysfunctional gut microbiota.

Understanding these processes is a first step to addressing them, Shulzhenko said. Once researchers have a better idea of what constitutes healthy microbiota in the gut, they may be able to personalize therapies to restore that balance. It should also be possible to identify and use new types of probiotics to mitigate the impact of antibiotics, when such drugs are necessary and must be used.

Such approaches are "an exciting target for therapeutic interventions" to treat health problems in the future, the researchers concluded.

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Older And Stronger

 Older And Stronger

 Dr. Stephen Chaney

Loss of muscle mass, or sarcopenia as it is known in the medical world, is a significant problem for older adults.

Simply put, we become less able to synthesize muscle protein as we age.

Adults over the age of 50 require a higher protein intake in their diet if they want to maintain muscle mass than adults in their 20s, 30s or 40s. And they also require more protein in their post-workout meal if they want increase muscle mass.

And, unfortunately, many older adults are simply not getting that extra protein in their diet. They tend to eat smaller meals and often avoid meats because of health concerns.

The result is that they lose muscle mass year after year until the simple act of picking up a grandchild or a sack of groceries represents a struggle. And because of the loss in muscle mass they become unsteady on their feet and prone to falls.

I've talked about this previously in my health tip "Protein Needs Increase As We Age", which is archived at http://www.chaneyhealth.com.

It also turns out that the naturally-occurring amino acid leucine is an important ally in the battle to maintain or increase muscle mass in older adults.

In addition to its role as a protein building block, leucine specifically stimulates muscle protein
synthesis.

As part of a diet providing adequate protein, leucine has been shown to help maintain muscle mass in older adults and help increase muscle mass in adults who are doing weight bearing exercises.

And, it's not just older adults who benefit from leucine. It has also been shown to help maintain muscle mass on low calorie, weight loss diets.

I've described these effects of leucine in more detail in my health tips "Protein Needs Increase As We Age" and "The Importance of Leucine", which are archived at http://www.chaneyhealth.com.

The study that I am discussing today (Casperson et al, Clinical Nutrition, doi:10.1016/j.clnu.2012.01.005) takes the leucine story one step further.

In this study the researchers asked the question of whether leucine supplementation would help older adults maintain muscle mass even if they did not work out or change the rest of their diet to increase protein intake.

They enrolled 8 healthy, but sedentary, older adults with an average age of 68 into the study. The study specifically excluded any adults who were working out. The subjects were given 12 grams of leucine every day for a two week period and told not to make any changes to their normal exercise and eating patterns.

On the day before and the day after the two-week leucine supplementation they were given a test meal containing 7 grams of essential amino acids and 10 grams of sucrose dissolved in a diet soda. The researchers designed this "meal" to be equivalent to approximately a half a chicken breast and a half cup of rice, which they considered to be a typical meal for someone in that age group. (I don't know about you, but I would have preferred the chicken and rice).

The researchers then took a series of muscle biopsies over the next several hours and measured the percentage of the amino acids from the test "meal" that wereincorporated into muscle protein (something called "mixed muscle fractional synthesis rate" or FSR).

The results were pretty clear cut. Two-weeks of leucine supplementation significantly increased the FSR following ingestion of the test "meal". The researchers concluded that "The amino acid leucine may help older people synthesize muscle in reponse to lower protein diets"

So what is the bottom line for you?

1) While this study suggests that supplemental leucine may be able to help preserve muscle mass even in sedentary older adults consuming a relatively low protein diet, previous studies suggest that the extra leucine will be even more effective when the protein intake is also increased.

I personally prefer a holistic approach rather than just looking for the one magic "pill" that will take care of everthing. My recommendation would be to work out on a regular basis and consider a protein supplement containing the extra leucine to make sure that protein intake is also where it needs to be.

2) We also need to remember that the test "meal" was pretty high in protein. Leucine supplementation is unlikely to help build muscle mass following a muffin and coffee for breakfast or a salad for lunch.

To Your Health!
Dr. Stephen G Chaney

Dr. Chaney has a BS in Chemistry from Duke University and a PhD in Biochemistry from UCLA. He currently holds the rank of Professor at a major university where he runs an active cancer research program and has published over 100 scientific articles and reviews in peer-reviewed scientific journals.

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