A new Finnish study states that people who eat lots of berries will reduce their risk of metabolic syndrome.

Lingonberry, sea buckthorn, bilberry, and black currants may not be berries that you eat every day, but these less common berries pack a huge punch. A recent study has shown that consumption of these berries reduces the risk of metabolic syndrome.

A new study from Finnish scientists has shown that berries are highly linked to the functioning of our liver as well as our risk for metabolic syndrome. Dr. Heikki Kallio and his fellow researchers took women who were approximately age 43 and divided them into two groups.  One group was given a supplement of Lingonberry, sea buckthorn, bilberry, and black currants. In the other group, berries were simply added to the women’s diets as a snack.

The study found that women who took the berry supplement had their ALAT levels decrease by 23%.  ALAT is a well-studied enzyme, which is linked to nonalcoholic fatty liver disease or NAFLAD. It is important to note that NAFLAD has been shown to increase the likelihood of metabolic syndrome.

According to Dr. Kallio and his researchers, “Present study results indicate common northern berries and berry products as an effective component of lifestyle modifications aimed at decreasing development of metabolic syndrome and subsequent complications.”

For those not familiar with metabolic syndrome, it is a condition that puts people at risk for a variety of serious problems like coronary artery disease, stroke and type 2 diabetes. Unfortunately, more and more people each year are becoming inflicted with metabolic syndrome. One of its symptoms includes weight gain that is centralized in the abdominal area. Those who suffer from metabolic syndrome also tend to become insulin resistant.

In general, the recommended treatment for metabolic syndrome has been to lose weight and exercise. A low fat diet high in fruits and vegetables is recommended. Fish oil has also been shown to be very useful in treating metabolic syndrome. You can read my Fish oil supplement recommendation in this article.

Another healthy food that has been shown to be effective at reducing the symptoms of metabolic syndrome are nuts. Now we can also add berries to this list of foods that help fight this ever-increasing health issue.

Of course, you should be eating as many berries as possible, even if you aren’t worried about metabolic syndrome. Berries provide our bodies with countless benefits, as they are full of antioxidants, minerals, flavonoids and phytochemicals.

Sources:
nutraingredients.com
health.google.com
nutrition.about.com

Black currant berries are a very rich source of Anthocyanins.

Anthocyanins – the phytochemical compound found in brightly colored vegetables – are so health-promoting, so ubiquitous in their disease prevention, there ought to be an anthocyanin anthology.

As documented here, anthocyanins help prevent cancer cell growth.  And as documented here, the anthocyanins in red cabbage helps prevent Alzheimer’s and metabolic syndrome.

The latest addition to the anthocyanin anthology?  They may improve one’s cholesterol profile.

Anyone at least mildly versed in health matters knows there are two types of cholesterol:  HDL, the good kind, and LDL, the bad kind.  So the ideal way to improve that profile is to increase the good cholesterol while lowering the bad cholesterol, right?
Well, anthocyanins appear able to pull off that double-duty trick…and then some.

According to a study of 120 people (not rats, as is so often the case), participants supplementing with high amounts of anthocyanin reduced their LDL cholesterol by nearly 14 percent (13.6 percent) and increased their HDL profile by 14 percent (13.7 percent).  This was based on a 12-week study of 40 to 65-year-old men and women, all of whom had dyslipidemia.  Dyslipidemia is a blood disorder characterized by high levels of triglycerides, LDL cholesterol, or both.

Approximately half of the participants received a daily supplement containing 320 milligrams of anthocyanins for about three months.  The other half received a placebo.  By the end of the study, the anthocyanin contingent saw serious improvements in their cholesterol count (again, about a 14 percent uptick in HDL), while the placebo group barely scratched the surface in improvement (a mere 3 percent increased HDL count).  And the LDL lowering fared even worse – just a 0.6 percent drop (compared to the anthrocyanin group, which dropped 13.6 percent).

The study was randomized and double-blind, which lends credibility to the test because it means that neither the test subjects nor the researchers themselves knew whether the supplement contained anthocyanins or were water pills.

The researchers – who hail from Sun Yat-Sen University in Kaohsiung, China – believe that anthocyanins help improve cholesterol profiles because of an LDL cholesterol-clearing protein they contain called CETP. CETP replaces triglycerides with cholesterol esters, the chemical compound make-up of HDL.

The study is published in the online version of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, soon to be published in its print version.

I’m all for supplementation, as most of you know, but there’s nothing better than getting anthocyanins from foods themselves.  And because anthocyanins are what give fruits and vegetables their color, anyone who eats their fruits and veggies regularly is getting a healthy dose of anthocyanins already.

But for those looking for the highest yield, look no further than the bodacious berry.  Berries are chock full of them, even fruits that resemble berries but aren’t really berries, like grapes and cherries.  The supreme leader of the berry barrel in anthocyanins is the black currant, which can carry up to 400 mg for every 100 grams.

The blackberry, blueberry, chokeberry and cranberry round out the top five berries.

But that’s among berries.  If you’re looking for the head honcho, the grand poo-bah in anthocyanin count, that title goes to the underappreciated eggplant.  There’s a whopping 750 milligrams of anthocyanins in 100 grams of eggplant.

Source:
nutraingredients.com
food-info.net