Summit Total Health

The “Fountain of Youth” Found in Red Grapes

Before you can fully understand the importance of antioxidants like Resveratrol, you need to fully understand the dangers of what are called “free radicals”.

What are free radicals?

In a nutshell, free radicals occur when there are weak bonds between molecules in your body. Once formed, free radicals are very unstable and react quickly with other compounds, trying to make connections with other molecules, sometimes “attacking” and “stealing” from other molecules. Once a molecule is “attacked”, it becomes a free radical itself. This begins a dangerous chain reaction. Once the process is started, it has a snowball-effect finally resulting in the disruption of one of your cells.
Some free radicals arise naturally during metabolism, and other body functions. Sometimes the body’s immune system’s cells purposefully create them to neutralize viruses and bacteria. However, environmental factors such as pollution, toxins, radiation, cigarette smoke, and herbicides can also spawn free radicals.

The Importance of Good Exercise Technique

written by Mario F. Cruz, PT, DPT, ATC & Karla Caban, BS Exercise Physiologist for Summit Total Health

Physical activity and exercise are a very important part of healthy well being. Unfortunately, lack of exercise technique and poor exercise habits can put individuals at risk for exercise related injuries. Whether am individual is inexperienced, resuming an exercise routine or an elite athlete, adequate exercise technique is imperative to improve performance and to minimize the chances of injury. 

The human musculo-skeletal system is designed to withstand moderate to high workloads at moderate to high velocities, provided that appropriate and correct training techniques are utilized. Poor technique is just one reason that you might experience injury when working out.. There are other major variables related to poor exercise habits that can predispose individuals to injuries.
Here are a few common reasons:

• Lack of Flexibility
• Not Enough Rest
• Dehydration
• Lack of or Inappropriate Pre-Exercise Warm-up
• Not Performing Post-Exercise Cool-Down
• Malnutrition
• Lack of Knowledge of a Particular Sport or Activity

The Importance of Taking Multivitamins

Would it surprise you to learn that many of us do not get the Recommended Daily Intake (RDI) of vitamins and minerals necessary from our foods, even if we are consuming the suggested daily servings of fruits and vegetables?

Due to current farming practices, mass food production, processing, and cooking, our foods are less nutrient-dense than they were in previous years. In fact, The U.S. Department of Agriculture says that it takes seven cups of today’s spinach to equal the nutrition that a single cup provided in 1960.
Vitamins and minerals help maintain cellular efficiency by activating enzyme systems that are essential to cellular function. Phyto-nutrients which are found in various forms of plant life are so important that nutritionists recommend at least 5 to 7 servings of fruits and vegetables per day, and suggest even more is better. Sadly, less than one in five Americans get even half of these amounts.
Two Harvard researchers, Robert H. Fletcher, MD and Kathleen M. Fairfield, MD, are working to help us understand the importance of taking a daily multiple formula in order- to help get the nutrients that one may need to prevent certain diseases such as cancer, heart disease, and osteoporosis.

The Life-Saving Ingredients in Broccoli Sprouts

Although health-nuts embraced raw sprouts during the 70s, it wasn’t until the 90s that broccoli sprouts burst into the mainstream. That’s because in 1992 a team from John Hopkins University found that broccoli sprouts had a cancer-fighting phytochemical in it called glucoraphanin. 
They also found that when chewed, broccoli releases enzymes which work together to produce sulphoraphane, which activates your body’s immune system to go into detox-mode.

This 1992 study was followed by the discovery in 1997 that this sulphoraphane was 20 times more concentrated in 3 to 4 day old broccoli sprouts rather than full-grown broccoli. This was written about in the New York Times causing a global shortage of broccoli seeds because of high demand.