The symptoms of high blood sugar can cause very serious long-term damage to your body — even if you feel fine.
Metabolic syndrome — a cluster of symptoms including high blood sugar, obesity and cardiovascular problems — has reached epidemic proportions. Excess weight, particularly around the waistline, is the biggest contributor to metabolic syndrome.
A person with metabolic syndrome is twice as likely to develop heart disease and five times more likely to develop diabetes. Other silent symptoms include eye, kidney and nervous system damage over time.
Genetics and Chronic Disease
You may have heard that certain chronic diseases — including obesity and type II diabetes — can be genetic. But new groundbreaking research is uncovering a higher level of complexity beyond genetic variation. Even better news: proper nutrition can produce positive changes at this higher level.
A recent article by the Associated Presshighlighted new data the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) project recently published in Nature – the international weekly journal of science.
“The scientific establishment has finally acknowledged that there is more than just DNA or the genome to explain how chronic diseases develop and how the environment, like nutrition and lifestyle, can have profound effects in altering our health,” said Dr. Alfredo Galvez, renowned research scientist at the Center of Excellence in Nutritional Genomics at UC Davis and lead scientific advisor at the Missouri Plant Science Center.
One of the most exciting discoveries in the fight against metabolic syndrome was discovered by Dr. Galvez: a soy peptide called lunasin. Lunasin works beyond the genome at the epigenomic level to promote optimal health.
Changes in the epigenome can cause symptoms associated with metabolic syndrome. Lunasin attaches to the histones and helps the epigenome function properly, so that these changes do not occur in the cells.
How Lunasin Helps Lower Cholesterol
High cholesterol is one of the key risk factors for metabolic syndrome. Studies show that lunasin is largely responsible for soy’s acknowledged cholesterol-lowering properties.
Cholesterol comes from two sources: dietary intake and our body’s own production in the liver. Over 80% of cholesterol comes from the liver, so the most effective way to lower LDL (bad) cholesterol is to control the liver’s internal production. lunasin does so in two ways:
- · Selectively disrupts a step in the production of an enzyme key to cholesterol synthesis in the liver.
- · Increases the number of receptors available in liver cells to clear LDL cholesterol from the bloodstream.
Most cholesterol is produced in the liver by the HMG-CoA reductase gene. Statin drugs work by blocking HMG-CoA, but they can often block too much. This leads to serious side effects because our body needs a minimum level of cholesterol for proper cellular function. On the other hand, lunasin targets cholesterol at an earlier stage, reducing the HMG-CoA without blocking it entirely.
Video: Watch how lunasin works.
A Note From Dr. Carl: A Nutritional Solution
GlucAffect® is a cutting-edge nutritional approach to metabolic syndrome. A patented formula combines scientifically proven ingredients to address three factors of metabolic syndrome: blood sugar, weight and cholesterol.
In an eight-week clinical study of overweight individuals with elevated blood glucose levels, subjects taking four daily servings of GlucAffect lowered their fasting blood glucose by an average of 30% and lost an average of nearly 16 pounds. Read the study.
The recent addition of LunaRich® soy powder significantly increases the lunasin content in GlucAffect and its ability to combat metabolic syndrome.
We can all take a simple step to combat the epidemic of obesity and metabolic syndrome. It’s as simple as telling people about Reliv. Who will you share GlucAffect with today?
To your health,
Dr. Carl Hastings
Vice Chairman and Chief Scientific Officer
Sources:
- http://diabetes.diabetesjournals.org/content/54/7/1899.full
- http://reliv-content.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/old/userfiles/Glucaffect%20Clinical%20Trial.pdf http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/natural/993.html http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14633804 http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/26/12/3215.long http://www.medicinenet.com/metabolic_syndrome/article.htm
- http://www.lunasin.com/About/CardiovascularResearch.aspx
- http://diabetes.webmd.com/guide/preventing-type-2-diabetes
- http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/epigenetics/nutrition/