Month: June 2018

Are you Anaemic?

Nigel Slate Supplements

Anaemia is a serious condition which can affect men or women of all ages. Often we only discover we are anaemic after having a blood test carried out at the doctors. You may notice that you feel extremely tired even soon after you have slept. You may have noticed a loss of energy and that you feel like you have no motivation. You may also have heart palpitations and feel like you are short of breath. These are all common signs of anaemia which can often be why people eventually go to the doctors to find out what is wrong.

When you have anaemia, your body doesn’t produce enough red blood cells. You don’t get enough oxygen, which makes you feel fatigued and can also cause serious health complications.

Your doctor will carry out a full blood count and check your level of red blood cells. If the results come back low then you will be given a course of iron tablets to take to help replace the iron lost in your body. These are usually stronger than the over the counter supplements you can buy. Often you will need to take the iron tablets for 6 months and then have another test to see if you can stop them.

 

Watch out for hidden sugars

Nigel Slate Food

When trying to maintain a balanced healthy diet it’s important to think about how much sugar we have. The first type of sugar to think about is added sugars. These are in so many things that are considered healthy such as granola type cereals and breakfast bars as well as the more obvious things like chocolates and sweets. There is also a lot of added sugars to many drinks particularly fruit juices that are described as ‘Juice drink’. Fizzy drinks, unless diet drinks, are loaded with added sugar and yet as they are not filling they can be consumed with little regard to the amount of sugar that they contain.

The other sugars to be aware of are naturally occurring sugars such as fructose, glucose and lactose. These sugars are digested quickly and rapidly release the sugar into the bloodstream giving us a sugar hit then a deficit quickly after. Fruits high in sugar include pineapple, which has 16g of sugar per slice, bananas with 17g of sugar per banana and watermelon with 18g of sugar per wedge. Now these foods are still considered healthy as they contain many important vitamins however they should be eaten in moderation due to their high sugar content and the effects that sugar can have on the teeth and in fact the whole body.