With all the emphasis on low-fat diets and dangerous super low calorie no-fat diets, it’s easy to forget that the body actually needs a certain amount of some important fats.
In this article your local Fort Worth Chiropractor will discuss healthy fats and the benefit of including them in your diet.
These good fats include monounsaturated, polyunsaturated and omega-3 fatty acids. These fats provide energy, ensure good cellular structure and allow you to utilize fat-soluble vitamins, such as A and E.
A study at Harvard University found that deficiency in omega-3 fatty acid kills as many as 96 thousand Americans every year. That number makes it the sixth biggest killer of Americans.
Some of the major benefits of taking in moderate amounts of these healthy fats include significant improvement in…
- Depression
- Vision
- Hearing
- Memory
- Sleep
- Organ Health
- General Brain Function
And that’s just to name few.
It also reduces your risk of…
- Cancer
- Stroke
- Obesity
- Heart Attack
- Diabetes (Type 2)
- Liver Disease
- Arthritis
Most Americans agree that ingesting too much fat is taking years and quality of living off their life; however, it’s actually trans and saturated fat that contributes to those common ailments listed above.
The good fats have been proven in numerous studies to actually improve our health in many ways when eaten in moderation. So the bottom line really is that, just like the American Heart Association recommends, you must limit
the amount of trans and saturated fats in your diet, while increasing your unsaturated fat intake. Check out these dos and don’ts from the Harvard School of Public Health:
Eliminate trans fats from partially hydrogenated oils. Check food labels for trans fats; avoid fried fast foods. Go grilled or baked instead.
Limit your intake of saturated fats by cutting back on red meat and full-fat dairy foods. Try replacing red meat with beans, nuts, poultry, and fish whenever possible, and switching from whole milk and other full-fat dairy foods to lower fat versions.
In place of butter, use liquid vegetable oils rich in polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats in cooking and at the table. Canola and olive oils are good options.
Eat one or more good sources of omega-3 fats every day—fish, walnuts, canola or soybean oil, ground flax seeds or flaxseed oil.
Eating ‘low fat’ diets has been the American slogan that so many have adhered to for more than the last 10 years. Why hasn’t cutting fat from the diet paid off as expected? Detailed research—much of it done at Harvard—shows that the total amount of fat in the diet isn’t really linked with weight or disease.
What really matters is the type of fat in the diet. Bad fats, meaning trans and saturated fats, increase the risk for certain diseases. Good fats, meaning monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, do just the opposite. They are good for the heart and most other parts of the body.
Photo by Jakub Kapusnak, Brooke Lark and Dan Gold on Unsplash