Vitamins, minerals & supplements Archive

Q. I keep reading that peanut butter is a healthy food. But it contains saturated fat and has more sodium than potassium. That doesn't sound healthy to me. Is peanut butter good for you?

A. The presence of saturated fat doesn't automatically kick a food into the "unhealthy" camp. Olive oil, wheat germ, and even tofu — all "healthy" foods — have some saturated fat. It's the whole package of nutrients, not just one or two, that determines how good a particular food is for health.

There's no mercury to worry about, and flaxseed oil  does contain omega-3 fats...but not the best kind.

Troll the medical literature, and you'll come up with study after study showing that fish and fish oil are good for us, especially for our hearts but maybe also for our moods and immune systems. Various epidemiologic investigations have found that people who eat fish regularly are less likely to have heart attacks, suffer strokes, or die from sudden cardiac arrest. The definition of "regularly" varies, but it usually means at least a couple of times a week, although eating fish even once a month has been shown to make a difference.

Fish, and especially fish oil, have also been the subject of dozens of randomized clinical trials, most involving people with existing heart conditions. In large amounts (several grams a day), fish oil has been shown to nudge various cardiac risk factors ("good" HDL cholesterol, triglycerides, blood pressure) in the right direction.

Ask the doctor

Q. I hear that there are outbreaks of measles in the United States. I think I had measles when I was young, but I'm not sure. Do I need to worry?

A. The measles virus has been infecting humans for at least 1,000 years. When I was very young, in the 1940s, I got the measles. So did nearly every kid I knew; it is very contagious. I had a high fever, sneezing, coughing, very red eyes, and then a rash on my face and all over my body. Fortunately, I didn't develop the severe complications of measles: pneumonia (which affects one in 20 people with measles) or encephalitis (which affects one in 1,000 and can be fatal). Still, I was miserable for more than a week.

Stop aiming for a particular amount of servings in each food category and focus on total daily intake.

Trying to hit the mark on a healthy diet can be challenging. You need to eat enough of the right foods to meet your body's vitamin and mineral needs.

Experts have tried to guide us over the years by recommending goals of daily food servings — such as five to eight servings of fruits and vegetables per day. But your idea of serving sizes may differ from someone else's. That's led to confusion and, now, change.

News briefs

Here's some relief for people with urinary incontinence who don't want to take pills to treat the problem: behavioral therapy (bladder training) works better for urinary incontinence than medication, according to a study published online March 18, 2019, by Annals of Internal Medicine. Researchers reviewed 84 randomized trials of women (average age 55). The studies evaluated 14 categories of incontinence treatments, including pill-free therapy and medications such as anticholinergic drugs — for example, oxybutynin (Ditropan). Most of the strategies (except taking hormones or getting injections of a bulking agent near the urethra) were more effective than doing nothing to treat incontinence. But for both stress incontinence (the kind that makes you leak when you laugh) and urge incontinence (the kind that makes you rush to the bathroom), behavioral therapy was the most effective treatment, beating medications and neuromodulation (electrical stimulation of the nerves that control the bladder). The catch: it takes practice to make behavioral therapy effective. But it may be worth the effort, since medications for incontinence often have side effects.

News briefs

As we've reported before, free medically tailored meals are making a big difference for older adults who have chronic illness or are recovering from a hospital stay. The meals are provided by nonprofit agencies and are customized to your dietary needs — like a potassium-controlled diet if you have kidney disease, or a diet low in vitamin K if you're taking a blood thinner. Now an observational study published online April 22, 2019, by JAMA Network Open suggests that taking part in a free medically tailored meal program is linked to fewer admissions to hospitals and nursing homes, as well as lower medical costs. Researchers looked at about 1,000 adults with health problems such as cancer or diabetes. Half took part in a free medically tailored meal program for about a year; the other half did not. During a two-year follow-up, people who received medically tailored meals had 49% fewer hospital admissions and 72% fewer nursing home admissions than those who did not receive meals. Getting the meals was also tied to a 16% reduction in medical costs each month. To find a program near you, check out the partner section of the Food Is Medicine Coalition (www.fimcoalition.org/partners).

Image: © FredFroese/Getty Images

Advice about eating eggs has evolved over the years. Should you go easy on this popular protein source?

Over the years, eggs have taken a bit of a beating, starting in the late 1960s. That's when the American Heart Association advised people to cut back on cholesterol in their diets and to eat no more than three whole eggs a week.

Decades later, eggs got a break after studies suggested that for most people, an egg a day was A-OK for heart health. But a recent report cracked down on eggs once again, suggesting that we return to the yolk-rationed days of yore (see "No yolk: Eggs linked to slightly higher risk of heart disease").

Mung beans are popular in many Asian cuisines, where they're used in soups, curries, savory pancakes, and even desserts. These small, olive-green beans have a white speck at the center. Some say the mild flavor of mung beans is reminiscent of potatoes.

Natural food stores and some conventional grocery stores may carry dried mung beans, either packaged or in bulk bins. But Americans are probably more familiar with mung bean sprouts, which are used in Chinese and Thai stir-fries. You can often find these slender, crunchy white sprouts in the produce section of your supermarket. Studies show that mung bean sprouts contain slightly higher levels of beneficial antioxidants than the unsprouted beans.

Research we're watching

Eating healthy, plant-based proteins such as beans and nuts instead of red meat may lower your odds of heart disease, new research finds.

Researchers analyzed data from 36 trials that involved more than 1,800 people to see how different diets affect cholesterol, blood pressure, and other heart disease risk factors. When they compared diets with red meat to all other types of diets combined, there weren't any notable differences in cholesterol or blood pressure (although red-meat diets did lead to high levels of triglycerides, a type of fat in the blood).