Source(s):

Lauren Zander, cofounder and chairman, The Handel Group, www.thehandelgroup.com.

Joan Price

Lack of time is a primary reason people give for failing to get the recommended 30 to 60 minutes of moderate intensity exercise most days of the week. Admittedly, it can be tough to find such a big chunk of time in your busy schedule.
What helps: Instead of feeling compelled to cram an entire day’s worth of exercise into a single block of time, commit to fitting in little bursts of physical activity — two minutes, five minutes, 10 minutes — throughout the day. The more these “fitness minutes” add up, the more you reap the benefits of exercise, including improved health, better weight control, increased energy and a sense of well-being.

IN THE MORNING…

• When your alarm clock rings — instead of pressing the snooze button, get up and use those extra minutes to do some gentle yoga poses.
• While brushing your teeth — do calf raises. Standing, slowly rise onto the balls of your feet… hold for several seconds… return to the starting position. Repeat, continuing for two minutes.
• In the shower — give your upper back muscles a workout. Squeeze your shoulder blades together… hold for five to 10 seconds… rest for a moment. Repeat 10 to 15 times.
• While you style your hair — squeeze your buttocks muscles as hard as you can for 10 seconds… rest for several seconds… repeat five to 10 times.
• When going down stairs — turn around at the bottom of the stairs and go back up, making one or more extra up-and-down trips.
• As the coffee is brewing — hop on your right foot 10 times… then hop on the left foot. Repeat twice.
• When letting the dog out — go with him for a short walk.

OUT AND ABOUT…

• At the gas station — walk inside to pay rather than swiping a credit card at the pump. Instead of sitting in your car as the gas flows, clean all your windows, alternating the hand that holds the squeegee.
• At every red light — do shoulder shrugs and roll your shoulders… repeatedly tighten and release your thigh muscles… rotate one wrist, then the other wrist.
• When parking — instead of finding a spot close to your destination, get one a few blocks away.
• Upon entering a store — if all the items you need will fit in a shopping basket, choose a basket instead of a cart.
• As you shop — if you need a cart, do 10 bicep curls with weightier items — soup cans, juice jugs — before placing them in your cart. (If you feel silly doing this in public, do your bicep curls at home as you put the items in the pantry.)
• While waiting in line — work your abdominal muscles. Suck in your belly and tighten your abs… hold for 10 seconds… relax. Repeat five to 10 times.
• On a long car trip — stop every 50 miles or so, and take a walk around a rest stop or scenic area.
• When traveling by bus, plane or train — walk up and down the aisle for at least five minutes every hour.

AT YOUR DESK…

• While on the phone — march in place or pace around your office.
• As you read e-mail — lift your right foot several inches off the floor… rotate your ankle clockwise several times, then counterclockwise… lower the foot. Repeat on the left side.
• If you need to talk with a coworker — walk over to her office instead of phoning. When you get back to your own desk, before sitting down, hold your arms out to the side and circle them forward 15 times, then backward.
• Each time you finish a task — do “chair dips.” With feet flat on the floor, place your hands on the armrests and push your body up (so your rear end hovers above the seat)… hold for several seconds… lower yourself back into the chair. Repeat 10 times. (Skip this if your chair has wheels.)
• During your lunch break — take a walk through the office complex.
• In the restroom — stand and reach for the sky for 30 seconds… then do 10 jumping jacks.
• If you drop a pencil (or at least once a day) — do a variation on toe touches. Stand up, bend down, pick up the pencil, straighten up… drop the pencil again. Repeat 10 times.

IN THE EVENING…

• Before starting dinner — take a quick ride around the neighborhood on your bicycle.
• At the dinner table — do leg lifts. Sit with feet flat on the floor. Straighten your right leg to hold your right foot out in front of you… lift your right thigh a few inches off the chair and hold for several seconds… lower the foot. Repeat 10 times, then switch to the left leg.
• Doing laundry — when you grab a basket of clothes, tighten abdominal muscles and, with your back straight, lift the basket from hip height to chest height five times.
• Listening to the radio or a CD — dance around the room for one entire song. Repeat several times.
• While watching TV — pop an exercise video or DVD in your player. Every time the TV show cuts to a commercial break, turn on the player and follow along with the workout for several minutes.
• Climbing the stairs — take the steps two at a time. (Do not do this if you have balance problems.)
• After washing your face — tilt your head slowly from side to side, feeling a good stretch along your neck… try to touch your chin to your chest to stretch the back of your neck.
• Before climbing into bed — raise your arms overhead… tilt gently to the right, feeling the stretch along the left side of your torso… then tilt to the left. Repeat five times.
• When you lie down — do knee hugs. Lie on your back with your knees bent, feet flat on the mattress. Raise one leg, place your hands behind the thigh and draw the leg toward your chest. Hold for 30 seconds… return to starting position. Repeat with the other leg.
• Closing your eyes — breathe in and out deeply 10 time
  s, feeling grateful for all that your body was capable of doing during the day.

Source(s):

Bottom Line/Women’s Health interviewed Joan Price, a certified fitness instructor and motivational speaker based in Sebastopol, California, and author of six books, including “The Anytime, Anywhere Exercise Book” (iUniverse). She credits her commitment to exercise for her success in twice regaining the ability to walk and dance after two head-on car crashes. www.joanprice.com

Source(s):Henry M. Kuerer, MD, PhD, professor and director breast surgical oncology training program, The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston.

Source(s):Tores Theorell, MD, PhD, professor emeritus, Stress Research Institute, Stockholm University, Sweden.Emil F. Coccaro, MD, E.C. Manning Professor and Chairman, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral neuroscience, Biological Sciences Division, The University of Chicago.

Jeff  Yeager

Nearly all of the talk these days about economizing focuses on how to get what we want but pay less for it. It’s all about how to get more for less.
For those of us who are longtime advocates of the “simple living” movement, it seems as if most Americans are missing what could be the golden opportunity of these tough times — coming to appreciate that less can often be more. In other words, we shouldn’t be worrying so much about “How can we afford it?” Instead, we should be asking ourselves, “Do we really need it?”
Here are five lifestyle changes to consider. They may seem fairly radical to you when you first think about them — but if you adopt even one or two, you’ll not only save some serious money, you just might be happier in the end.

1. Cancel your cell phone.
Yearly savings: $1,000 per phone.
The idea is surprising, I know, but just consider it for a moment. Only 20 or so years ago, cell phones were virtually nonexistent, and the world seemed to work okay. Now cell phones are considered a necessity, even though surveys show that we dislike our cell phones more than any other device that we own (including the alarm clock). So if that’s truly how we feel, how can giving them up be a bad thing? The average cell-phone plan costs about $80 a month, and a study recently released by Utility Consumers’ Action Network found that the actual average cost of using a cell phone is more than $3 a minute if you don’t use up most of your minutes and about $1 per minute even if you do use all of your minutes. As a fairly successful author and national media personality, I am the poster child for this cause — I have never owned a cell phone, and I get by just fine.
If you can’t imagine not having a cell phone, consider a prepaid phone plan. Watch for sales at such stores as Target, Wal-Mart and Radio Shack.

2. Get rid of your second or third car.
Yearly savings: $9,000.
The average American household now owns two or three vehicles. That compares to about one per household in 1960. AAA estimates that it costs $9,369 per year to own and operate a medium-sized sedan that is driven 15,000 miles annually. The national average cost per mile is 61 cents by the time you factor in depreciation, insurance, repairs, gas, taxes, etc. If your family owns more than one car, what’s the worst thing that could happen if you give up one? You could easily save thousands of dollars a year by sharing a single car, coordinating trips, taking public transportation and so on. And Mother Earth will thank you.

3. Prepare more meals at home.
Yearly savings: $2,000.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average US family spends $2,668 each year eating out. I would estimate that you could prepare the same meals at home for about 80% less, or an annual savings of roughly $2,134. The other upside is that old-fashioned family time around the dinner table may make a comeback. An article in Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine reported that frequent family meals are associated with a lower risk for smoking, drinking and using marijuana among adolescents, as well as a lower incidence of depressive symptoms and suicidal thoughts. And the kids were more likely to have better grades.

4. Wear out your clothing.
Yearly savings: $1,800 per family.
A small fraction of the clothing we throw away in the US is truly “worn out,” meaning that it’s threadbare, torn or badly stained. Many of us donate unwanted clothing to charity, but even charities have more donations than they can handle, and much of the clothing eventually ends up being thrown away. The problem is that we rarely wear out our clothing — or much of anything else — these days. According to some government reports, the average American family spends roughly $1,800 on shoes and clothing per year. Clearly most of us have more than enough in our closets to go for six months to a year, or even longer, without needing to buy anything new.

5. Give up college room and board.
Yearly savings: $9,000 per student.
The average cost of student room and board at colleges and universities is about $9,000 per year. A generational shift has occurred here in the US over the past few decades when it comes to kids living with their parents while they attend college. Back in my college days (the 1970s), lots of us — myself included — lived with our parents and attended a local university or community college. Today that arrangement is fairly rare — it’s just not “cool” to live with your folks. Of course, in my day, student loans were uncommon, in part because we didn’t need to borrow money to pay for room and board. The irony is that these days, many kids graduate with so much debt — tens of thousands of dollars in student loans — that they have no choice but to move back home with their parents after college. Now, back in my day, living with your parents after you graduated really was uncool.

Source(s):
Bottom Line/Personal interviewed Jeff Yeager, dubbed “The Ultimate Cheapskate” by NBC’s Today show. Yeager honed his cheapskating skills during 25 years of working with underfunded nonprofit agencies. He lives in Accokeek, Maryland, and is author of “The Ultimate Cheapskate’s Road Map to True Riches” (Broadway). www.ultimatecheapskate.com.

• Weakened immunity. The immune system normally patrols the body for bacteria and viruses, as well as for cancer cells. When it spots something foreign, it dispatches a variety of cells, including natural killer cells, to destroy the foreign substance. In people who eat an unhealthy diet — not enough produce, too much alcohol, very little fish and so on — the immune system works less efficiently. This means that cancer cells can potentially slip under the radar and eventually proliferate.
• Inflammation. Millions of Americans have subclinical chronic inflammation. It doesn’t cause symptoms, but it can lead to heart disease and cancer. Chronic inflammation can be caused by infection, a diet low in antioxidant nutrients and even emotional stress. It’s accompanied by the release of cytokines and other inflammatory chemicals. Inflammation also prevents the immune system from working efficiently.
• Angiogenesis. Cancer cells, like other cells in the body, need blood and nourishment to survive. They send out chemical signals that stimulate the growth of blood vessels that carry blood to and from the cancer.

• Fatty fish. The omega-3 fatty acids in fish reduce inflammation. Oncologists in Scotland have measured inflammatory markers in the blood of cancer patients since the 1990s. They have found that patients with the lowest levels of inflammation are twice as likely to live through the next several years as patients who have more inflammation.

• Low-glycemic carbohydrates. The glycemic index measures the effects of the carbohydrates in foods on blood glucose levels. Foods with a high-glycemic index, such as white bread and table sugar, cause a rapid rise in insulin as well as a rise in insulin-like growth factor (IGF). IGF stimulates cell growth, including the growth of cancer cells. Both insulin and IGF also promote inflammation.

• Green tea. Between three and five cups daily can significantly reduce your cancer risk. A chemical in green tea, epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), inhibits angiogenesis. Green tea also contains polyphenols and other chemical compounds that reduce inflammation and activate liver enzymes that break down and eliminate potential carcinogens. In men who already have prostate cancer, consuming five cups or more of green tea daily has been associated with reduced risk of progressing to advanced cancer by 50%. In women with certain types of breast cancer, three cups daily reduced relapses by 30%. Because black tea is fermented, it has a lower concentration of polyphenols and is less protective than green tea.
• Soy foods. The isoflavones in tofu, soy milk, edamame (green soybeans) and other soy foods help prevent breast cancer, particularly in women who started eating soy early in life. These compounds, known as phytoestrogens, have estrogen-like effects. They occupy the same cellular receptors as the body’s estrogen yet are only about one-hundredth as active. This means that they may slow the development of estrogen-dependent tumors.

• Turmeric. No other food ingredient has more powerful anti-inflammatory effects. In laboratory studies, the active ingredient curcumin in the spice turmeric inhibits the growth of many different cancers. It helps prevent angiogenesis and promotes the death of cancer cells.

• Asian mushrooms, such as shiitake, maitake and enokitake. They’re available in most supermarkets and gourmet stores and are one of the most potent immune system stimulants. Among people who eat a lot of these mushrooms, the rate of stomach cancer is 50% lower than it is among those who don’t eat them. One to two half-cup servings weekly probably is enough to have measureable effects.
• Berries. Berries contain ellagic acid, which strongly inhibits angiogenesis. Aim for one-half cup per day.
• Dark chocolate. One ounce contains twice as many polyphenols as a glass of red wine and almost as much as a cup of green tea. Laboratory studies indicate that these compounds slow the growth of cancer cells. Look for a chocolate with more than 70% cocoa. The “lighter” milk chocolates don’t contain adequate amounts of polyphenols — and the dairy component of milk chocolate blocks the absorption of polyphenols.

Source(s):

Bottom Line/Personal interviewed David Servan-Schreiber, MD, PhD, a neuroscientist and clinical professor of psychiatry at University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. He is cofounder of the university’s Center for Integrative Medicine and author of “Anticancer: A New Way of Life” (Viking). www.anticancerbook.com.

• You are offered a “free” medical screening or equipment (such as a wheelchair, walker or diabetic supplies) — all you have to do is provide your Social Security number, Medicare information and/or health insurance policy number. Sometimes free medical offers are legitimate — for example, your community hospital may offer periodic free or discounted health screenings, such as mammograms or blood pressure tests. Be suspicious, however, of such offers at or near commercial settings such as shopping malls or health clubs — they may be “rolling lab” schemes in which scammers skip from mall to mall or gym to gym, administer tests (which may themselves be bogus), then bill them to your insurance or Medicare. And, as for that free wheelchair, why would a company simply give you medical equipment? Once an unscrupulous company has your signature, it can try to bill Medicare for equipment or services you do not need or do not receive.

• You (and/or your insurance company) are charged for services that were not provided. Crooked physicians involve themselves in schemes to obtain “reimbursement” for medical visits you never made or tests you never had. They assume that you won’t look closely at your statements and that if you do, you won’t know one treatment from another. You can protect yourself by keeping careful records of all medical appointments and procedures and comparing them with statements from your doctor and insurer. If you detect a discrepancy, immediately contact your insurance company to challenge it. Many companies offer ways to report suspected fraud on their Web sites.

• Request copies of your current medical files from all medical providers. You have a legal right to these documents under HIPAA (the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996). Carefully review them and correct any false or incorrect information.

• Be careful with your Social Security, Medicare and insurance policy information — these are the tools thieves use to steal medical identities. Though you can do little to keep them from gaining access by hacking into a company’s database or breaking into a doctor’s office, you should protect this information in every way you can. Shred all documents with these numbers so that they can’t get them from your trash.A common trick: Calling and requesting a policy number or other private information because it is necessary “in order to process a payment or claim.” If someone wants your Social Security number or other such information, always ask why. Sometimes there are legitimate reasons — for instance, perhaps a hospital requires this information to be paid for treating you. In that event, verify that it is a legitimate request by asking for the caller’s name — then you can call the hospital and ask to speak to that person. If you discover that there’s no such person, promptly report the incident to your insurance company (as you should with any suspected fraud).

• Never sign a blank insurance form. Fill out, sign and date only one claim form at a time. Giving blanket authorization to providers to bill for services can lead to overcharges and other abuses. Keep copies of all such forms.

• Don’t agree to let your health-care provider keep your credit card number on file. When you conduct medical transactions online — such as refilling prescriptions or purchasing contact lenses — Goodman advises minimizing data exposure by typing in your information each time you order. When you trust your credit/debit card data to these institutions, you are also trusting that they are safeguarding it adequately, and all too often that is not the case.

• Use care when disposing of confidential information since any private information can be used to get more. Shred ATM and credit card receipts and take security measures with stored paper documents, computers, iPods, PDAs, smart phones, computer printers and other electronic devices that can store personal data.

• Do not assume that all is well because you don’t owe money. Once every few months, make a point of sitting down to compare your medical bills with the Explanation of Benefits (EOB) statements from your insurer. Follow up on any discrepancies, such as services you did not get, office visits you did not make or medical equipment you did not use.

• Always scrutinize your monthly credit card statements, including health-care charges. Promptly report any unauthorized transactions to the issuer and any instance of suspected fraud to your insurer.

• Monitor your credit report. Request a free copy from each of the three nationwide consumer credit-reporting agencies at least once a year and review it for suspicious entries. If you detect any, challenge them. If necessary, file a police report. To get your report, go to http://www.annualcreditreport.comor call 877-322-8228.

Source(s):Eduard F. Goodman, JD, LLM, CIPP, chief privacy officer, Identity Theft 911, LLC, Scottsdale, Arizona. Goodman is an expert in privacy and personal data protection, wireless networking liabilities and cyber-terrorism. He served as the 2008-2009 Section chair of the State Bar of Arizona’s Internet, E-Commerce & Technology Law Practice Section.

The death of a spouse is among the greatest sources of grief. We not only lose the person who may be closest to us, we lose the person who most likely helped us function in the world and on whom we depended to help us through life’s traumas. The loss of a spouse might leave us feeling more alone and helpless than we ever have felt before.

MIXED EMOTIONS

Naturally there are feelings of sadness, but surviving spouses have other feelings as well…

A sense of unreality. In the weeks after a spouse’s death, it is hard to accept the fact that the person with whom we have shared our life is gone. Many surviving spouses catch themselves momentarily forgetting that their partner has died. It might cross their minds to call the spouse to say they are going to be late… or to buy his/her favorite food at the market.

Difficulty concentrating. It is common for surviving spouses to experience a sense of disorganization and difficulty concentrating in the weeks or months after the death. They might feel lethargic and uninterested in going out or doing anything at all.

Anger. Surviving spouses sometimes are surprised to discover they feel angry, even, at the departed spouse for dying.

Relief. In some cases, a spouse’s death brings feelings of relief, particularly if the spouse who passed away had been suffering or had come to require huge amounts of care.

Guilt. When surviving spouses feel anger or relief, they often feel guilty about these feelings. Some surviving spouses also feel guilty because they imagine that they could have treated their partner better during the marriage.

GRIEVING

Some books about loss discuss the grieving process as if one stage of grief leads predictably to the next. In reality, grief does not always progress according to a preset pattern. Some surviving spouses find that life begins to return to normal within a few months, while for others, it takes years. The grieving process tends to take a long time when…

Each spouse had a clearly defined role in the marriage, and the surviving spouse must develop new skills to perform the tasks that the departed partner once handled.

The spouse’s death involved extended or significant suffering. Seeing a spouse in agony can cause posttraumatic stress. Professional counseling can help surviving spouses cope with this.

The death is sudden or unexpected. In this situation, the surviving spouse must come to terms with the loss of a partner as well as the shattering of illusions that the world is safe.

There is no “correct” amount of time to grieve the death of a spouse. Grief usually eases as time passes. You feel more hopeful and more like yourself six months after the death than you did three months after… and even better three months after that. (Of course, there will be good days and bad days throughout.) If this is not the case, it might be time to seek counseling.

COPING

There is no way to avoid the grief you will feel following the loss of your spouse — it would not even be healthy to try to avoid it. There are, however, some ways to keep the grieving process moving in the right direction…

Acknowledge the range of your feelings. Some widows and widowers try to ignore any emotions they feel after their spouses’ deaths, aside from grief and sadness. They think it isn’t reasonable to feel anger, relief or guilt. If you deny yourself the right to experience these emotions, you will find it difficult to deal with your grief as well.

Example: A woman was mired in grief five years after the death of her husband. She was unwilling to admit to herself that she was angry with him for being financially irresponsible. Only when she came to terms with this anger was she able to move beyond her grief.

Put your feelings into words. Talking about loss can help you cope. Speak with a friend or a counselor — or join a bereavement support group. A hospital, hospice or religious organization often can help you find a group in your area.

If you prefer not to share your feelings verbally, write them in a journal or in an unsent letter to the departed spouse.

Remain connected with friends. It is normal to want privacy following the death of a spouse — but don’t remain isolated longer than you must. As soon as you feel you could manage to go out and spend time with friends, do so — do not wait until you actually want to go out. Spending time with other people gives you an opportunity to focus on something other than your loss, reducing the odds that you will be pulled into the downward spiral of depression.

If you do not feel ready to resume close relationships, pick activities that let you interact with other people but that keep the chitchat to a minimum, such as playing tennis or going to a movie.

Balance activity and free time. Exercise, join clubs, do volunteer work or engage in other activities that get you out of the house and get your mind off your loss as soon as you feel able to do so. Do not become so busy that you have no free time to reflect, however. Try to find at least a few minutes of unscheduled time each day when you can relax, either at home or outside taking a walk.

Get enough sleep. Schedule enough sleep time that you wake feeling rested. That might mean more than eight hours a night at first. If you’re having trouble sleeping, talk with your doctor. Sleep deprivation makes any kind of emotional healing that much more difficult.

Give yourself what your spouse would have given you. Surviving spouses sometimes feel cheated out of long-planned vacations and promised gifts when their partners pass away. Giving these gifts to yourself can help you overcome these emotions. Example: Take that long-planned trip to Europe with a close friend.

Sources:

Bottom Line/Personal interviewed Phyllis Kosminsky, PhD, a clinical social worker specializing in grief, loss and trauma at the Darien, Connecticut-based Center for Hope/Family Centers, a nonprofit organization. She also is in private practice in Pleasantville, New York, and Norwalk, Connecticut. She is author of Getting Back to Life When Grief Won’t Heal (McGraw-Hill). www.familycenters.org.

“You are what you eat” has been a catch phrase since I was a child… but new research from Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City suggests it’s not only what you eat but how hot you cook it that matters. Subjecting certain foods to prolonged high heat — not only for frying, but also for grilling, roasting, broiling or baking — creates toxic, inflammatory particles. These, in turn, cause the oxidation and inflammation in the body that are associated with such diseases as diabetes, heart disease, kidney disease, Alzheimer’s disease and others.

Called advanced glycation end products (AGEs), these toxic particles adhere to the arteries, kidneys, brain and joints, where they heighten inflammation. Our typical Western diet, heavy on meat and processed foods and light on plant-based foods, is believed by many scientists to contain at least three times more AGEs than is considered safe.

Good News from this Study

It’s always exciting when research reveals a way to avoid a common health problem — and this new study does just that. According to the researchers, you can achieve dramatic and quick benefit — within just days — by reducing your intake of AGE-containing foods. Doing this decreases the body’s level of inflammation and helps restore its defenses against disease.

The study divided 350-plus participants into three groups — healthy adults between the ages of 18 and 45… an older healthy group, all past age 60… and nine patients with chronic kidney disease (the kidneys are believed to be especially sensitive to AGEs). Participants were randomly assigned to eat either a regular Western diet in which foods were grilled, fried or baked (in other words, loaded with AGEs) or what the researchers called “the AGE-less diet,” which included the same foods, only poached, boiled or steamed so that they contained only about half as many AGEs. The two diets were similar in calories and nutrients. After four months, all participants on the AGE-less diet showed a 60% decline in blood levels of AGEs as well as in several other inflammation markers. According to the study’s lead author, Helen Vlassara, MD, professor and director of the division of experimental diabetes and aging at Mount Sinai, this indicates that your actual chronological age may not be as significant a factor in aging and health as the AGEs in your food. A finding that’s even more impressive: The patients with kidney disease had a similarly substantial reduction after just one month on the AGE-less diet.

The Heat Is On…

I asked Dr. Vlassara to explain to me how the AGEs get into foods. They develop as a chemical reaction when heat is combined with protein and different sugars, she said — and she noted that meat-rich diets are especially bad, since meats contain high levels of easily oxidizable fat and protein.

There is a third point that is crucial to understand — which is that removing all visible fat when you cook meats doesn’t solve the problem. All cells in meats contain not only fat and proteins, but also sugars — some more reactive than others. Therefore, exposure to high heat will still cause AGEs to form in meat at much higher levels than in starch even if you cut away the visible fat. In fact, Dr. Vlassara told me that when you see meat brown while cooking, what you’re witnessing is the rapid reaction among proteins, fats and those reactive sugars to the heat. And, since they are also animal products, when they are cooked, full-fat milk and cheese also develop high levels of AGEs.

Even worse, manufacturers often add AGE-containing flavor-enhancers or coloring (such as caramel) to processed and packaged foods. You may be surprised to learn that a major offender in this category is dark-colored soda. Generally speaking, fast foods and processed/packaged foods also tend to be high in AGEs, which gives us yet another reason to avoid them.

Avoiding AGEs

The good news is, it’s not all that difficult to reduce the amount of AGEs in your diet, Dr. Vlassara said. It just requires making some modest changes in the way you prepare food. Her suggestions…

Meats

• Marinate in an acid-based mixture (such as vinegar or lemon juice) before cooking, which helps reduce the amount of AGEs produced by heat. Note: Avoid marinades containing sugar, such as most barbecue and teriyaki sauces.

• Aim to serve meats rare to medium rare if possible — for instance, cooking pork to just beyond pink. This is admittedly a balancing act — you want to cook as briefly as possible to minimize development of AGEs, but undercooking carries its own set of dangers.

• To achieve a brown finish to meats, Dr. Vlassara suggests cooking on your stovetop with a cover to conserve moisture, and then placing the meat under the broiler for just a few minutes at the end.

• Use as little fat as possible — as Dr. Vlassara points out, even healthy olive oil oxidizes at high heat.

• Water inhibits the formation of AGEs, so poaching, stewing, steaming or even boiling proteins is best (including fish and eggs).

Dairy and Other Foods

• Avoid bringing dairy products to high temperatures — for instance, when using milk in sauces or when melting cheese under a broiler. Dr. Vlassara said the less time these foods cook, the better. She added that lower temperatures are preferable, as is increased distance from the heat source.

• Brief microwaving produces a lower level of AGEs than broiling, grilling or stovetop cooking, so this is a great way to cook liquids.

• Plant-based proteins also create dangerous levels of AGEs when subject to very high heat for long periods — so be aware that there are dangers to even seemingly healthy foods like broiled tofu or roasted nuts.

what about restaurant food?

Fortunately, the increasingly popular Mediterranean Diet uses lots of foods with low AGEs (including fruits, vegetables, beans and whole grains), so it once again ranks among the healthiest ways that you can eat. This not only provides a good framework for eating at home, it also suggests a wide variety of delicious, healthful, low-AGE dishes that you can order in restaurants. But Dr. Vlassara noted that cooking even these foods at high heat with low hydration is problematic, so there’s no way around it — cooking at high temperatures is not so hot for your health.

Source(s):

Helen Vlassara, MD, is professor of geriatrics, medicine and molecular medicine, director, division of experimental diabetes and aging, department of geriatric and palliative medicine, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York City.