Greetings, it's Eric Bakker the naturopath from New Zealand.
Thanks for coming back.
We're talking about the health benefits of polyphenols.
If you haven't seen the previous video I did on polyphenols, like what are polyphenols
and how they work, check that video out.
So what we're going to talk about now is why these compounds found in plants and various
things in nature are so good for you and particularly what conditions are they good for?
Well, it's well known now through research now, dating back probably a hundred years
or more the plant-based foods obviously superior for health than most of the foods we can eat.
But it's the actual chemicals inside these plants that are really beneficial for us,
as well as their structure.
If you look at people like me, who used herbal medicines in their clinic for decades and
decades and people before me going right back a hundred years plus, people used a lot of
herbal medicines and still do today.
The herbal medicines are compounds often that use alcohol as an extraction method.
Anywhere from five, 10, 20 up to 40%.
So alcohol has a fantastic ability to extract the polyphenol compounds out of a wide range
of plants, as well as alkaloids in different chemicals and plants.
These are basically drugs.
So the first medical doctors were actually...
In fact on my shelf here, one of my bookshelves, I've got a British medical book from 1903.
And the book's basically full of herbal medicines that medical doctors use in practice.
Of course, until pharmacy came along after the war and then just killed it all off.
But people like me still use herbal medicines and they're still effective.
Now why?
Herbal medicines are basically natural drugs.
We've extracted the natural drugs, particularly the polyphenol compounds out of a wide range
of plants.
And we've got that in a bottle, a herbal medicine bottle.
Now a bottle of red wine, the finest pinot noir... well this isn't exactly pinot noir...
Let's just say it's a blue wine from Iceland or something, but a really good bottle of
pinot or cabernet sauvignon with an alcoholic content of 13% will have a lot of polyphenols
extracted in that wine.
And this is why a small glass of red wine a day is exceptional for health, because you've
got such a high polyphenol content in there, right?
Anyway, getting off track here, but let's look at a couple of the key things that polyphenols
will do to your body if you take them in regularly.
One thing we know is that they have a nice effect on lowering blood sugar levels.
And the studies show that people who were consuming a much higher plant-based diet loaded
with polyphenol-rich foods had almost 60% ability to develop diabetes than people who
didn't.
People who are prone to getting diabetes didn't really develop it like they predictably should
have developed it because the polyphenol content was so high in their diet.
So the risk is reduced.
And the risk is reduced because of its effect on blood sugar.
So when you start having a high polyphenol content diet, it delays the ability of starch
to breakdown to simple sugars.
So it's stopping, basically, spikes in blood sugar.
There are many other compounds in polyphenol foods that are beneficial.
Like if we look at onion, for example, exceptionally good food for the bowel, high in polyphenols
and flavonoids, particularly, I think it's [inaudible 00:00:03:32], which is exceptionally
good also for diabetics for other reasons.
So plants basically are medicines and that's what Hippocrates always said, the father of
medicine.
"Let food be your medicine."
So lowering blood sugar levels is a really good reason to have more green tea in your
diet or a small piece of dark chocolate or a cup of blueberries every day, all those
foods rich in polyphenols, this is what you want to eat if you want to prevent a lot of
disease.
So lowering blood sugar, lowering risk of diabetes, lowering risk of heart disease,
reducing risk of chronic inflammation, leading to heart disease.
Most disease comes from inflammation, we know that.
If we look at the three big ones: cancer, diabetes, heart disease, inflammation underpins.
If we can knock inflammation, slash it down, we can reduce the risk.
And that's what polyphenols will do for you.
So "A" was lowering blood sugar levels, we're stopping that flux of blood sugar, lowering
diabetes risk.
"B" is lowering your risk of heart disease by reducing chronic inflammation.
Two studies have also shown, for example, that a high polyphenol content diet will lower
the bad cholesterol and another study showed that it increases the good cholesterol.
The third reason why you want to put polyphenol foods in your diet is because of its ability
to stop platelet aggregation or blood clotting.
Now blood clotting is good if you cut yourself, like I think I cut my neck yesterday on a
nail.
I was working outside and I'm just moving around the yard and I got a big scratch, four
inch nail, "sheeng," scratched my neck.
Now within an hour or so, that's all clotted up, it's basically healing.
So you want the blood to clot in appropriate areas, but of course you don't want inappropriate
blood clotting leading to thrombosis, leading to stroke, leading to heart attack, all these
kinds of things.
So to stop inappropriate platelet aggregation, we need to have a diet that sufficient in
foods that will prevent that.
And again, polyphenols will help to mitigate that, will help to stop the inappropriate
platelet clumping up.
So again, if you've got a diet rich in saturated fats, like deep fried fats, soda drinks, Dunkin
Donuts and junk like that.
Well, it's not exactly going to do your blood system much good is it?
You're probably going to end up with some type of heart disease or circulatory disease
with a crappy diet like that.
So if you look at the fourth area, it's brain function, again, many studies have shown this,
that people who have a high polyphenol content diet tend to have better memory, better recall,
and also less chance of getting dementia and problems like that as they get older.
Gingko Biloba, the famous herb ginkgo, is high in polyphenols.
It's a very antioxidant-rich herbal medicine.
Chocolate, red wine, small amount of red wine per day will go a long way.
So there's a study I was reading an interesting one where they gave a group of people, a grapefruit
juice to drink, older people, for 12 weeks.
And they found their memory improved after 12 weeks, just from that one glass of red
fruit juice per day.
It's amazing.
So if we look at area number five, the cancer risk is reduced and that's because polyphenols
have an interesting effect on the immune system, as well as targeting cancer cells directly.
So certain cancer cell lines are really seriously reduced under the influence of various polyphenols
in the diet.
What have we got here?
That's right.
A study also showed a high polyphenol level had a reduced of multiple cancers.
So various cancers...
The risk reduction has been linked to polyphenols basically.
And the last one, which is number six, good bacteria increase.
So polyphenols also increase bifidobacteria or good bacteria in your digestive system.
And there were certain polyphenols also that help to reduce the risk of salmonella and
C. Diff, clostridium difficile, and E. coli infections in the gut.
So suffice to say, polyphenols are really what you want to have in your diet.
You're not going to get those benefits of eating meat.
You're going to get it more from eating vegetables, fruits, and compounds high in antioxidants.
Thanks for tuning in.