Tips for Workplace Health

Recent studies have shown that sitting behind a desk for long periods of time can be hazardous to your health…but it can be hard to integrate exercise into our work schedules. In an effort to help keep people healthy while at work, more and more employers are offering workplace wellness programs, offering everything from gym memberships to help with smoking cessation. Read more in our Be A Prepared Patient Feature Staying Well at Work.

But what if your company doesn’t yet offer a wellness program? No problem, says Kenneth Clarke, owner of the one-on-one personal training studio Fitness Together, located in Silver Spring, Md. Clarke says following these tips can improve your health while making minimal change to your busy work schedule:

• Form a lunchtime or before-work walking group. You and your co-workers can keep each other accountable. 
• Find a parking spot far away from the front entrance or if taking public transportation, get off a stop or two early.
• Invite a local, trusted fitness professional to conduct a weekly lunchtime or after-work boot camp/fitness class.
• Choose healthy snacks and lunches for office celebrations, instead of the usual donuts, bagels, and baked, sugar-laden foods.

More Resources for Staying Healthy at Work

• Healthy at work advice and exercises from the Mayo Clinic
• WebMD’s 10 Tips to Improve Your Health at Work
• NHS Boost your health at work- tips from the UK’s National Health Service

Health Benefit of Dates

Dates are among the most ancient of fruits, growing along the Nile as early as the 5th century B.C. Perhaps the Egyptians knew dates' sweetness hit a bounty of nutrients. Dates are nuggets of nutrition that satisfy a sweet tooth, making them ideal snacks to stave off hunger. True, dates provide more caloriesthan most fruits, but they make a great substitute for processed sweets, like candy, to help you stick to your weight-loss routine.

California dates are sodium-free, fat-free, cholesterol-free, and a good source of fiber -- all of which are important factors in keeping the pounds off. Learn about this sweet fruit and how it can help slim your waistline and improve your overall health.

Health Benefits

Loaded with fiber -- both soluble and insoluble -- dates are able to fill you up and keep your bowel habits regular. They are an excellent source of potassium and provide numerous other important vitamins and minerals -- quite a powerhouse packed in a tiny, portable package.

Selection and Storage

Most supermarkets stock fresh dates in the produce section and keep dried dates near raisins. For both types, look for plump fruit with unbroken, smoothly wrinkled skins. Avoid dates that smell bad or have hardened sugar crystals on their skins.

Packaged dates are available pitted, unpitted, or chopped. Dried dates keep for up to a year in the refrigerator. Fresh dates should be refrigerated in tightly sealed containers; they'll keep up to eight months. If stored in the kitchen cabinet, they'll stay fresh for about a month.

If dates dry out, they can be "plumped" with a little warm water, fruit juice, or for fancier dishes, your favorite liqueur. Don't store dates near strongly flavored items such as garlic. Dates tend to absorb outside odors.

Health benefits of quince

1. Quince is low calorie fruit. 100 g fresh raw fruit provides 57 calories. In addition, it composes several vital poly-phenolic antioxidants than apples and pears. The fruit is the storehouse for phyto-nutrients such as dietary fiber, minerals, and vitamins.
2. Quince pulp along with its peel contains good amounts of fiber. Further, its gritty granules in the pulp are composed of astringent compounds known as tannins namely, catechin and epicatechin. They bind to cancer-causing toxins and chemicals in the colon, protecting its mucous membrane from inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), cancers, and diverticulitis. In addition, it helps reduce body weight and blood LDL cholesterol levels.
3. It has several phenolic compounds such as caffeoylquinic acid, procyanidin-B2, oligomeric procyanidin, polymeric procyanidin etc., and essential oils like furfural, limonene, linalol, vomifoliol, toluene, β-ionone, α-terpineol, etc. Together; these compounds give quince its unique fragrance.
4. Ripe quince fruit has good concentration of vitamin C. 100 g fruit provides 15 mg or 25% of RDA of vitamin-C. Fruits rich in this vitamin help remove harmful oxygen-free radicals from the body. Vitamin C helps boost immunity, reduce viral episodes and inflammatory conditions.
5. The fruit is a good source of minerals such as copper (130 µg or 14% of RDA), iron, potassium, and magnesium as well as B-complex vitamins such as thiamin, riboflavin and pyridoxine (vitamin B-6).
6. Although not well documented, quince fruit, like pears, has anti-allergenic and anti-inflammatory properties. The fruit as well its seed's extraction is suggested in the treatment of cystitis, atopic dermatitis, recommended by health practitioners as a safe alternative in the preparation of food products for allergy sufferers.

Health Benefits of Guava

Some of the surprising and brilliant health benefits are listed below.

Weight loss: Guava is very helpful for those who want to lose weight without compromising their intake of proteins, vitamins and fiber. Guava is very high in roughage and rich in vitamins, proteins and minerals, but it has no cholesterol and a low number of digestible carbohydrates. It is a is very filling snack and satisfies the appetite very easily. Guava, especially raw guava, also has far less sugar as compared to apples, oranges, grapes, and other fruit. Adding a medium-sized guava to your lunch and you will not feel hungry again until the evening. Ironically, it can also help with weight gain in lean, thin people. This is probably due to its wealth of nutrients, which keep the metabolism regulates and helps to promote the proper absorption of nutrients.

Eyesight: Guavas are extremely good sources of vitamin-A, which is well known as a booster for vision health. It can help slow down the appearance of cataracts, macular degeneration, and general health of the eyes. It can not only prevent degradation of eyesight, but even an improvement in eyesight once it has begun to degrade.

Thyroid Health: Guavas are a good source for copper, which is an important part of regulating thyroid metabolism by helping to control hormone production and absorption. The thyroid gland is one of the most important glands in the body for regulating hormones and organ system function, so guava can help balance your health in many ways.

Brain Health: Another of the tremendous positive benefits of guavas is the presence of B3 and B6 vitamins. B3 (also known as niacin) can increase blood flow and stimulates cognitive function. B6 is a great nutrient for brain and nerve function. Therefore, eating guava can help you increase brain function and sharpen you focus.

High blood pressure: Guava helps reduce cholesterol in the blood and prevents it from thickening, thereby maintaining the fluidity of blood and reducing blood pressure. Studies have shown that food lacking fiber (such as refined flour) add to blood pressure, due to its quick conversion to sugar. Guava, being very rich in fiber and hypoglycemic in nature, helps reduce blood pressure.

Other benefits:  There are so many health benefits of guava, it is hard to know where to begin. It is important to know that guava helps control diabetes and protects the prostate.  The juice of guava leaves has been known to cure toothaches, swollen gums & oral ulcers, and the juice speeds up the h

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2. ealing process of wounds when applied externally. Finally, it reduces the frequency of convulsions, epilepsy, and bacterial infections.

 Strawberries

I think eating fruit in moderation is great for fat loss because it can effectively help control calorie intake while providing essential vitamins and minerals. My top 3 favorite fruits are strawberries, apples, and grapefruits. A cup of strawberries only has 50 calories and 7 grams of sugar, yet provides 3 grams of fiber. What I also love about strawberries (and all berries) is they satisfy your sweet/sugar cravings as well, and they boast a very impressive nutrient profile. An apple is only 100 calories, is easy to carry around, and makes a great pre-workout snack. After that is grapefruit because it has been shown to help control blood sugar, it really helps fill you up, and I love the taste

Health Benefits of Bananas

Bananas, as with most fruits, are incredibly nutritious and can contribute to a healthy, balanced diet, whether you are trying to lose weight or not.  Here are some of the health benefits that bananas can bring to your diet.

High potassium

Bananas contain a variety of vitamins and minerals; however, they are especially rich in potassium.  Potassium is an essential mineral in the body and is required for body systems, including the cardiovascular, nervous, digestive, renal and neuromuscular systems, to function correctly.

Potassium is also important in maintaining the fluid balance in the body.  A large banana contains about 600mg of potassium.

Low in Fat

Bananas contain very little fat, about 0.5g per medium fruit, meaning they are suitable as part of a low fat or calorie controlled diet.

Low GI

Although bananas are relatively high in carbohydrate or sugar, the effect that they have on blood sugar levels is relatively good.  Whilst some high carbohydrate foods are high GI, causing a sharp peak in blood sugar levels followed by a quick drop, bananas are low GI and result in a more moderate increase in blood sugar levels that stays constant for longer.

Low GI foods are beneficial for controlling hunger, as blood sugar levels are maintained for a longer period.  This makes a banana a great quick snack food that will keep you fuller for longer and help you to avoid snacking on high calorie foods or overeating throughout the day, which is a key factor in any weight loss diet.

Low GI diets are also thought to decrease the risk of lifestyle diseases such as diabetes and heart disease.

Other benefits

Research has suggested that bananas have a role in cancer prevention, although the mechanism is unclear as yet, studies have shown reduced incidence of renal cancer as well as childhood leukaemia with high banana intake.

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  How To Do the 3 Day Apple Diet Cleanse For Body Detox

Amongst other things the apple diet is a well-known single food complete diet as well as a replacement diet used in substitution to normal healthy eating habits to early decrease your calorie intake while acting as a colon cleanse. As for diets go the apple diet may be the simplest there are. All you have to do is eat nothing but apples for a 3 day period.

Although one of the strict requirement of the apple diet is to abstain from eating nothing but plain old apples throughout the course of dieting, one degree of freedom that it gives you is letting you eat as much apples as you want. This alleviates the fear of getting hungry. For this very reason, the apple diet is considered a half-fast diet, which doesn't restrict your food intake.

Commencing the completion of you 3 day apple diet cleanse one side effect is the lowered functionality of your stomach after digesting nothing but apples, which makes getting use to normal eating a potential obstacle in your diet. After getting back on your feet, avoid eating fatty foods eating easily digestible foods until your digestive tract is back up to one hundred percent.

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