What is the function of Calcium?
Calcium doesn’t only form bones but it is super nutrition necessary for us to live. It has turned out that it is effective to improve various diseases. Unexpected functions of calcium are controlling the muscles, regulating the movement of the heart and transmitting all the information in the brain such as sad, happy, painful or delicious. 3 diseases which are high blood pressure, stress and cancer can be improved by the effect of calcium. A person whose weight is 50 Kg has about 1 Kg of calcium. 99 % of 1 Kg is bones and teeth and remaining 1 % exists all over the body playing very important roles. Calcium is a kind of metal or mineral taken from the soil of the earth. If you take sufficient calcium, there is a possibility that you can lower your blood pressure without restricting salt strictly. In an experiment, 4 people whose blood pressures were higher than the guide line drank a glass of milk every meal and the movement of their blood pressures lowered down throughout a day compared to when they didn’t drink a glass of milk every meal. Blood pressure is usually low in the morning, gradually goes up, reaches its peak during the daytime and goes down at night. The blood pressure of people who take too much salt doesn’t go down at night, causing high blood pressure at night. But their blood pressures went down clearly. To lower blood pressure at night, it is necessary to remove salt from the body. So there is a possibility that calcium promoted the kidneys to discharge salt. High blood pressure at night raises the risk of stroke and dementia. There is a research result that high blood pressure at night raises the risk of stroke (cerebral infarction) 3 times more. How much calcium should be taken to improve high blood pressure? A glass of milk (200 cc) contains about 220 mg of calcium. If you want to take the same amount of calcium, 1-1/2 table spoon (3 g) of dried shrimp contains 213 mg of calcium. 2 pieces of processed cheese contains 226 mg of calcium. 2 cups of yogurt contains 240 mg of calcium. ¾ piece of tofu contains 194 mg of calcium. 4 pieces of capelin (a small fish) contain The most efficient food to take calcium is milk. It is difficult to absorb calcium and most calcium is discharged with fibers. Milk has high ratio of absorption compared to the other food, but it is better to take calcium eating in good balance. If you age is more than 30 years old, the recommended amount of calcium a day is about more than 650 to 700 mg for men and 650 mg for women. So if you drink 3 glasses of milk, it becomes about 660 mg of calcium. Relationship between Irritation and calcium Calcium is an important substance to transmit information in the brain. Lack of calcium causes a failure of transmitting information, resulting in irritation. Therefore, if you take sufficient calcium, the activity of the nerves becomes smooth and irritation can be solved. Relationship between cancer and calcium According to the newest research, it was found out that calcium caught carcinogen (a substance that tends to produce cancer) and discharged it to the outside of the body. Cancer that calcium is expected to prevent most is colon cancer. Colon cancer is a disease that mainly a benign tumor becomes cancerous by stimulation of carcinogen.
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Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) includes IgA nephropathy, diabetic nephropathy, membranous nephropathy and nephrosclerosis. The kidneys filtrate the blood and excrete wastes and toxins as urine. But even if the function of the kidneys lowers down, there are few subjective symptoms. If you keep putting a burden on the kidneys by eating too much salt, the kidney function stops before you realize. If the kidney function becomes less than 10 %, the kidneys can’t filtrate wastes and toxins in the blood sufficiently, resulting in necessity of dialysis.
Dialysis is a cleansing process of the blood that uses a special machine to filter wastes and toxins from the blood and return the blood to the body. In general, dialysis needs 4-5 hours per treatment, 2-3 times a week so daily life can be restricted. Dialysis also have to be continued for life. So it is important to prevent chronic kidney diseases. But if you improve the kidney function before it gets worse, you can expect the improvement of swelling, high blood pressure and frequent urination. The methods to remove salt from the body are urination and sweat. Since sweat is difficult to control, urination is the only method to remove salt taken from the mouth. The organ doing the job is the kidney. So if the kidney works too much, the kidney becomes exhausted and the function lowers down. The sense of the taste started becoming weak at the age of 65 in men and at the age of 60 in women. The insensitivity to the taste makes you take more salt. People who have kidney diseases are insensitive to salty taste. If they continue eating lightly salted food for about a week, their sensitivity to salt returns normal. How to reduce salt (1) Choose seasonings which show “Salt Equivalent”. You can calculate about how much salt you are taking. (2) Use a small measuring spoon, 1/8 tsp. (3) Season with materials with strong smell such as ginger or garlic. (4) Season with soup stocks or spices instead of salt. (5) Eat from light seasoned food. (6) Record what you ate and the amount of salt. Other methods: (1) Use juice of citrus fruits instead of salt. (2) Use crushed nuts for salads instead of dressing. The big cause of high blood pressure is too much salt intake.
When the concentration of salt in the blood becomes high, water goes into the blood vessels from the cells around to make the concentration thinner. That makes the amount of blood increase, pressing the wall of the blood vessel. This is the condition of high blood pressure. High blood pressure causes arteriosclerosis that the blood vessel becomes hard and narrow. It can lead to serious diseases such as stroke and heart attack. So it is important to reduce salt to improve high blood pressure. But it is difficult to continue reducing salt in daily life. Even if low salt is kept, sometimes high blood pressure is not improved as expected. A whale gave us the secret of how to solve this unconquerable problem? A whale is the biggest mammal on the earth. The characteristic is that they live very long. Some of them live for more than 200 years. So a researcher thought that whales must have maintained healthy blood vessels because they lived long. What is the difference between whales and human beings which are the same mammals? Is the difference related to dive under sea water? Based on such unique hypothesis, the researcher studied about blood vessels of the people who dived a lot into the sea. The people who the researcher paid attention to were Japanese female pearl divers who dived into the sea daily. When the researcher checked the condition of their blood vessel, surprising results were found out. 115 of Japanese female pearl divers whose average age was 65 years old were checked about their age of blood vessels (vascular age). The average of their vascular ages were 11 years younger than their actual ages. This proved that they could be controlling their blood pressure. Why are their vascular ages young? That their vascular ages are young is related to a hormone called ANP (Atrial Natriuretic Peptide) which is secreted by water pressure at the time of their diving. When we dive into water, the veins in our arms and legs are especially compressed because they are soft. That increases the amount of blood returning to the heart, making a part of the heart larger. At that time, the hormone called ANP is secreted by the muscles of the heart and is sent to all over the body. Especially the kidney is influenced by ANP and is promoted to excrete urine and excessive salt is discharged with the urine. As a result of that, blood pressure goes down and blood vessels are kept young. Actually ANP is used as medication for heart failure because it lowers blood pressure and reduces a burden on the heart. ANP of three Japanese female pearl divers was checked and the amount of ANP drastically increased right after diving. Also their blood pressures are within the normal range and their vascular ages were less than their actual ages. Age: 69 / 72 / 72 Before diving: 28.8 / 21 / 30 Right after diving: 44.5 / 73.1 / 129.6 Blood pressure: 134 / 126 / 123 (mmHg) Vascular age: early 50’s / early 50’s / late 60’s Divers dive to a depth of more than 5 meters (16.4 feet), but we can’t do that. So how deep do we need to dive or soak in the water to increase ANP? According to an experiment, it is possible to increase ANP if you soak into the pool above the pit of the stomach. 52 years old male whose blood pressure was about 140 mmHg tried to spend all day in a pool with his wife and daughters (9 and 11 years old). As a result, his ANP increased and blood pressure lowered after playing in the pool with his family as follows. ANP: Before 12.6 / After 31.6 Blood pressure: Before 143 mmHg / After 132 mmHg ANP and Cancer Cancer occurs everywhere in the body except the heart. One of the reasons that the heart doesn’t have cancer is ANP which is secreted from the heart. When ANP is administered to patients with cancer, the metastasis and recurrence are suppressed. How to increase ANP other than playing in the pool ANP is secreted by raising heart rate so it is effective to exercise as hard as breathing becomes a little heavy. It is necessary to be careful about blood pressure from the time when menstruation is irregular before menopause.
The important substance for menopausal women is NO (Nitrogen monoxide) which is secreted from endothelial cells which line the inside of every blood vessel in the body. NO has the function to protect the body from high blood pressure. NO affects smooth muscles of blood vessels and makes blood vessels larger and flexible. In addition, NO affects the kidneys and makes the kidneys easily excrete salt. NO prevents high blood pressure with two effects which are enlargement of blood vessels and excretion of salt. If NO is secreted profusely even after menopause, the function of the kidneys gets better, resulting in excreting salt sufficiently with urine. How can we increase the secretion of NO? Raising the core body temperature by 1 degrees C (1.8 degrees F) increases NO. If you raise the core body temperature by 1 degrees C by taking a bath, the amount of blood flow in the whole body increases and the blood flow becomes faster. Endothelial cells in blood vessels are stimulated by the faster blood flow, secreting NO profusely. What kind of bathing raises the core body temperature by 1 degrees C? The bathing method is soaking in a bath water which temperature is comfortable (about 41 degrees C (106 degrees F)) for 5-10 minutes up to the shoulders. The sign that the core body temperature rises by 1 degrees C is sweating on the face (Fig. 1). Verification of the bathing method to raise the core body temperature One of the six women (48 years old) could only excrete 5 grams of salt with urine out of 10 grams of salt she consumed a day. Salt not excreted with urine is stored in the body and she run a risk of having high blood pressure at any moment. Her NO secretion was checked by FMD test (Flow Medical Dilation Test) and it was 5.8 % which was less than reference value 6 %. She usually soaks in 42 degrees C water for 5 minutes. Her core body temperature increased by 0.6 degrees C which is less than required elevation of the core body temperature (1 degrees C) to increase NO. She tried the above bathing method for a week and then took 10 grams of salt a day from three meals and how much salt was excreted with urine was measured. The amount of salt she could excrete was 8.8 grams (more than 8 grams is normal) and NO secretion was 6.3 % (reference value: more than 6 %). She could improve salt excretion and NO secretion within a week by taking a bath the way described above. There are women who easily stores salt in the body.
The biggest cause of high blood pressure is over consumption of salt. Women who can’t easily discharge salt from the body When we take salt, about 20 % of it is discharged from the body as sweat and others. The remaining 80 % is all discharged from the kidneys with urine after a certain period of time. Since a type of women can’t discharge salt with urine, she has high blood pressure without over consumption of salt. 9 women (age of 40-60) checked the amount of salt in the urine for 24 hours taking 3 same meals containing total 10 grams of salt. If more than 80 % of salt which is more than 8 grams of salt is contained in the urine they discharged for 24 hours, she is diagnosed as normal. If it is less than 8 grams, she is diagnosed to easily store salt in the body. As a result of the experiment, it turned out that 6 out of 9 women easily stored salt in the body. the blood pressure of a woman whose discharge was normal returned to the original 60 minutes after a meal, but the blood pressure of the woman whose discharge of salt was less than normal took more than 2 and a half hours to return to the original blood pressure. So the state of high blood pressure continued for more than 90 minutes. All 6 of them had this kind of abnormal blood pressure after a meal. (Fig. 1) The common point among the 6 women is that they have been menopaused. There is postmenopausal hypertension which is high blood pressure after menopause. Before menopause, estrogen which is a type of female hormone is secreted a lot from the ovaries. Estrogen encourages menstruation. In addition to that, estrogen activates the function of the kidneys discharging urine. So before menopause, even if salt consumption is too much, the activated kidneys discharge the salt immediately with urine so that salt is not easily stored in the body. But after menopause, once the secretion of estrogen decreases significantly, the function of the kidneys lowers remarkably and salt is not able to be discharged very well. The state of high blood pressure continuing for a while after a meal is caused by menopause. Why does blood pressure rise?
The most well-known reason is salt. Why does taking too much salt cause high blood pressure? There are many small holes in the blood vessel. Water comes and goes between the blood vessel and the cell through the holes. Salt controls the amount of the water. Salt has the function to draw water, so if there is proper amount of salt in the blood, the amount of water in the blood becomes proper, maintaining normal blood flow. But if the amount of salt in the blood is too much, the amount of water drawn to salt increases and the amount of blood also increases. As a result, the pressure on the wall of the blood vessel gets higher. This is the state of high blood pressure caused by taking too much salt. But there are other causes of high blood pressure such as smoking, obesity, aging or lack of exercise. Quiz about high blood pressure It is known that high blood pressure is related to the person’s character. The person who tends to have high blood pressure has a specific way of sitting chairs. Q1. Which is the way of sitting chairs done by a person whose character leads to high blood pressure? (A) Sitting on the edge of the chair (B) Sitting back leaning to the backrest A1. (A) Sitting on the edge of the chair While (B) is a state of being relaxed with sitting back leaning to the back rest, (A) is a state of being restless that the person can move quickly any time sitting forward. This kind of person is called Type A whose characters are positive, active, irritated and restless. Since the person of Type A easily builds up stress, high blood pressure occurs, resulting in heart diseases. According to an experiment using simulated heart, in the case of healthy blood vessel, it pumps up water to 2 m high, but in the case of blood vessel with blood pressure 200 mmHg, it pumps up water 4 m high (Fig. 1). So the pressure becomes twice as high as healthy blood vessels’. If this high pressure always pushes the blood vessel, it is quite natural that the blood vessel become hard. Q2. Which disease does a person with high blood pressure tend to have? (A) Dementia (B) Breast cancer A2. (A) Dementia Progression of high blood pressure damages the blood vessels in the brain. Cholesterol invades there, producing plaques. If the plaques become big and stop the blood flow in the brain, it becomes difficult to deliver nutrition to the brain cells. As a result, the function of the brain cells becomes weaker and cerebrovascular dementia occurs. According to a research, a person with high blood pressure is 3.5 to 5 times as likely to develop cerebrovascular dementia, compared to a normal person. It is important to check your blood pressure regularly. Q3. When is the best timing to check your blood pressure within a day? (A) Right after you wake up in the morning (B) Right after you eat lunch (C) Right after you take a bath in the evening A3. (A) right after you wake up in the morning Blood pressure is up and down within a day. Blood pressure gradually goes up from before waking up and it becomes the highest in the afternoon. After that, it gradually goes down and becomes the lowest during sleep. When you eat something, blood pressure goes up and when you take a bath, it goes down. Blood pressure changes depending on the daily activities. So the time right after you wake up in the morning is suitable to check your blood pressure under the same condition without being influenced by various activities. If you are worried about high blood pressure, it is recommended to check your blood pressure twice a day when you wake up and when you go to bed at the same time. High blood pressure82 years old female whose blood pressure had been 160 mm Hg before started walking and her blood pressure became 120 mm Hg since then.
Her day starts with laundry. After washing, she hangs the laundry out to dry downstairs and upstairs to increase steps. Then she cleans her house. She earns about 1000 steps so far. At 11:30 am she walks fast to the station for 6 minutes. In addition, after getting off the train, she walks 30 minutes to learn magic tricks which she has continued for 20 years. So far she earns about 6000 steps. In the evening, she goes back home and prepares her dinner. She earns 8200 steps a day. To prevent high blood pressure, 8000 steps a day including 20 minutes of moderate-intense activities. In her case, going up and down stairs for drying the laundry and cleaning, and walking fast when she goes out are considered as moderate-intense activities. 8000 steps and moderate-intense activities make blood flow into the capillaries of the muscles unused usually, leading to making the blood flow of the whole body better and the heart not need extra force to send out blood, resulting in preventing the high blood pressure. This is the continuation from the last time and it is about another way to detect arteriosclerosis.
The renal arteries carry blood to the kidneys from abdominal aorta and the blood is filtered by the kidneys. If the renal arteries are narrowed or clogged by arteriosclerosis, the kidney can’t get blood so the kidneys secrete renin which is a kind of enzyme to increase the blood pressure. But since there is a blockage in the renal arteries, the kidney still can’t get blood so again they secrete renin. This process is repeated, resulting in the high blood pressure. If your blood pressure doesn’t go down with the medication you take now, there is a possibility of the arteriosclerosis of the renal arteries. In that case, you need to change the medication to the one which weakens the function of the hormone affected by renin and/or widen the narrowed renal artery by a stent that is an expandable tube. It is said that acetic acid included in vinegar has the following effects:
In Eastern medicine, sour taste affects the Liver (energy). In Western medicine, Liver produces neutral fat and cholesterol. So it is very persuasive that vinegar decreases neutral fat and cholesterol. In addition to the above effects, it is said that vinegar is good for diabetes. Vinegar controls the rapid rise of blood sugar because vinegar delays the food going to the intestines from the stomach, leading to slowing down the absorption of sugar. However, if you stop taking vinegar, it tend to return to the original condition, so it is important to take it every day. Good amount of vinegar you need to take every day is a table spoon of vinegar. |
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