Aren’t eggs supposed to be super healthy? Yes and no. Eggs are a food group that can be problematic depending on one's medical history - and no, it's not about cholesterol. The cholesterol debate - and what causes elevated levels in the body - was misleading and has long since been dismantled, but there are other aspects that make eggs less suitable for daily intake for everyone.
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Who should go vegan?
Yet another vegan “documentary” taking up space on Netflix these days: “You Are What You Eat: A Twin Experiment”. And it hasn’t even been more than a handful of years ago, there was the last wave of veganism driving through the country with the movie Game Changers on Netflix, swiping across the country with more peer pressure than your average influencer’s lip filler. Same arguments, same counter arguments. It gets boring for those of us who live long enough to see the circling trends in health care - same claims, same debunking and on and on it goes. Each generation has to learn from scratch all over again. Yes I sound like I’m a million years. But really, I don’t have patience for this utter nutritional nonsense trendy stuff proposed by self-claimed experts often with no relevant educational background when it comes to nutrition science.
I never really commented much on it, because we are missing the boat completely when it comes to changing our health by focusing so much on meat vs. plants, and the debate has so many emotional ties attached to it, that it rarely seems constructive to dive in.
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No, lemon water is not a "health gimmick"
I’ve been drinking lemon or grapefruit juice diluted into water the first thing every morning for decades, literally. Yes decades, without going further into dating myself here.
While I too get real tired of wild claims about this or that diet, mainly because there is never good science behind, I do not tire of the potential of understanding foods therapeutic impact on the body. Having worked with nutrition for 20 years, I have seen so many diets come and go, it drives me nuts, that we have to make something so simple, so very complicated.
It is actually quite simple: stop eating extremes, stop eating restrictive, figure out why your health is not good and treat the underlying cause of that.
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Mold - when your home is making you sick! NEW TALK (Zoom webinar - Danish only) 13th of April
Christina Santini has been the first therapist in Europe to treat mold exposure since 2013. Did you know that 25% af astma is linked to mold exposure? How about we treated the cause instead of the symptom! It is important to get a handle on our basic needs for healthy air and clean water before we embark on more advanced dietary trends - especially since diet does not help much if our water and air are highly polluted. Gain insight into whether this is a problem for you and possibly related to your symptoms and get help to find out how it can be best managed.
To sign up for webinar click here: https://tidslerne.nemtilmeld.dk/295/
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Read MoreIs a calorie a calorie? Stanford professor explains bad science.
This is a must see, if you are stuck on counting calories.
Read MoreI'm talking about our toxic relationship to food (podcast interview)
I'm talking about health myths and facts and what a healthy relationship to food really is.
Too many of us have a toxic relationship to food and our body, and it is time we focus on thriving, rather than depriving ourselves. Afterall, life is too short to be miserable.
Listen in on the Danish podcast show #tothemoon here (in Danish only).
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Too much omega-3 is too much of a good thing!
Did you know that too much Omega-3 actually impairs the immune system's ability to kill pathogens, thus increasing viral pathogen burden? Yes, many of us think that the more fish oil the better, but as with anything: too much of a good thing is just not a good thing anymore and - surprise - actually proinflammatory!
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Bad science: Grains and beans are not "bad foods"
Recently I read yet another post from one of the more famous health and nutrition influencers claiming that bread and beans are “inflammatory” and should be avoided by all who wants health. This is one of the most stubborn health myths around, as everyone and their grandma has gone glutenfree these days. And unfortunately many self-claimed health gurus keep pushing this bad science. The majority of the people pushing this have zero education in nutrition, and it shows. They may be great medical doctors, good chiropractors or just savvy businessmen, who now make a living off selling health gadgets after their own history of burn-out. However, this does not make their insight into nutritional biochemistry great - just like I shouldn’t go around offering surgery on everyone and sundry just cause I saw a youtube video about it. That would be pretty crazy, frankly. And I also think it is pretty crazy for everyone to wake up and write books and blogs about nutrition with zero educational background or in-clinic training. There are a lot of issues with this type of bad science being promoted.
Read MoreIs red wine healthy? (Interview feature in Vogue Scandinavia)
Should you cut out wine this year or is red wine really healthy? (I am interviewed for an article in Vogue Scandinavia).
Well, sort of and sort of not.
We know that happiness adds to longevity, and that a glass of red wine can add to that sense of relaxation and ease the tension. And that's a fine reason to drink a glass with your dinner 3-4 x week. but don't drink it for the resveratrol though. And also: if a slice of double chocolate cake does it for you, then cake is just as good as a glass of vino. Life is too short to be miserable and only eat salad (and that is not healthy for you anyway!)- and happiness does add years to our life. So live your life and drink that glass with your dinner, if it makes you happy (but not everyday - yeah, I still had to kill the party like that). Read full article here: https://www.voguescandinavia.com/articles/we-investigate-if-red-wine-is-really-the-healthiest-tipple-in-the-bar-and-why-we-should-drink-like-those-in-blue-zones and feel free to share it.
Read MoreWhy you can get fatter from fasting and eating late in the day
Everything in life is about timing. We know this intuitively - we can have the right credentials, but if we present ourselves to a potential business opportunity at the wrong time, we lose out. We can meet “the right person” at “the wrong time” - and we miss out.
I’d say the most important thing in life is neither talent nor hard work, but mastering the art of timing.
This essentially means we can get away with working smarter rather than harder in life at whatever goal it is we want. This doesn’t mean lazy, it just means understanding how to roll with resistance and surf on the waves, rather than swim against them and end up utterly burnt out. Which is, inevitable what many A-type personalities do: they keep at it til they are completely beyond exhaustion. While hard work can be admirable, there is nothing admirable about working yourself through to the bone. Life is supposed to be fun and we want to thrive.
And if we want that, the single most important thing to learn is how everything in life revolves around timing.
This applies especially to our body - how it secretes digestive enzymes and hormones at certain times throughout the day. How eating too much too late can interfere with proper detoxification at night and deep sleep. These are proven today to be irrefutable facts according to modern science and its study in circadian rhythm. Ironically this advice has been around since ancient time according to Ayurvedic teachings.
Read MoreHow to get over a hangover faster (interview feature in VOGUE Scandinavia)
I am interviewed for Vogue Scandinavia about facts and myths of hangover cures. Read full article here if you are a member of Vogue: https://www.voguescandinavia.com/articles/because-we-know-you-need-ithere-are-the-best-hangover-cures or if you are not a member you can read it in pdf here. Feel free to share it.
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Please don’t do “Coke light”, if I may add.
Why you do NOT want to consume "light" or "sugarfree"
I’ve never been a fan of light products. It’s just counterintuitive to common sense: the body counts calories partly based on taste in combo with calorie density, and if we mess with food, that will very likely have an impact on our appetite-satiety switch, which is the worst thing ever to mess with, if we wish to have a healthy relationship with food, body and weight. It is true: we don’t have science to support that drinking artificial sweetened products can be tied to serious diseases. However, I think that is pretty much besides the point. Just because you don’t get cancer from one single life-style factor, it doesn’t make it harmless.
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You. On coffee.
It is critical to understand that coffee should be consumed no more than 3-4 x weekly, in order to keep performance optimization in tact from caffeine. If we take in high amounts of caffeine daily, we deplete our adrenals and actually lower our baseline performance. In this case, coffee only serves to help us feel somewhat normal over time, rather than the over-performer we aim to be. So go check your coffee habits. Click on to get the studies.
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Natural vitamins superior to synthetic ones.
Science cannot create life. Only life can create life. Obviously, there is a difference. Supplements food-based, isolated or synthetic, has detracted from the most important part of health and healing. The basics of proper diet, exercise, detoxification, structure, mental/emotional and spiritual health must all be in order for true healing to occur. No supplement will work on its own if these foundations are not in place. However, even when these foundations are in place, or if the situation is acute enough to necessitate a more immediate treatment response, supplement support may still be needed for a while. You may also want to take one or more food-based supplements to ensure you are getting an adequate array of nutrients in your diet. When these situations arise, it is recommend food-based supplements be your first choice. How to known whether or not a supplement good choice? For starters, make sure it has the following characteristics: it is as close as possible to its natural form. The utmost care has been taken in all phases of its production, from growing its ingredients, to manufacturing, testing for potency and quality control. Select from companies that have a long track record of providing high quality products that produce good clinical results. Most vitamins sold are not food. They are synthetically processed petroleum and/or hydrogenated sugar extracts, even if they say “natural” on the label.
Read MoreIs your coffee maker making you sick? (How to fix it and still drink coffee)
The best way to drink coffee to avoid mold issues is to grind the beans and use them within a month and only use French press. However, if you are not up for that, then watch The Doctor’s discuss a couple useful tips for better coffee habits here:
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How hygienic is your coffee machine?
“The washer plate of the Nespresso® compatible coffee machine had a reading of 4000 colony forming units (CFU)! Anything more than 75 CFU as stated in the official Health Act (Act 63, 1977) on Total Microbial Activity is unsatisfactory and any reading above 1000 CFU is unacceptable as it raises major health concerns. SWIFT states that it requires immediate attention. The washer plate was therefore nearly 54 times over the limit of the official Health Act recommendation. The Mould reading came to 10 CFU on the washer plate, which is not concerning, but it is still not nice to know that mould could end up in your coffee cup.”
However, simply cleaning your Nespresso machine with something as simple as vinegar 1-2 x weekly will solve this issue. Read the article here.
Read MoreREPLAY of my talk on The Essential Role of Detoxification in Modern Life
Click on to watch the replay of the webinar I did for ASmallWorld members right here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDu6RD8UdRw&t=118s Feel free to share it.
Read MoreUsing a fat-based (keto) diet to increase efficacy of chemotherapy for cancer
Cancer cells grow in all of us at any given time. The difference between someone who gets sick from cancer and someone who doesn’t is their immune system’s ability to constantly kill new and growing cancer cells. That means the key to treating cancer lies both in symptomatically focusing on targeting and eliminating cancer cells that have managed to multiply out of control, but even more importantly in optimizing the immune system to effectively be able to suppress cancer cells on its own. A weak immune system causes a domino effect of disasters in the body, one of which can be cancer. Many factors influence our immune system and can block it from functioning optimally. When we have a blockage in the system i.e. heavy metal toxicity, virus or bacteria load, hormone imbalance, nutrient deficiencies, we have the perfect storm for cancer to use this opportunity to grow. Cancer is not just one disease, but many – and it is a symptom of an underlying cause that needs to be identified to prevent relapse.
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12 major things that affect your health today (and it's not gluten or cake)
When we want to improve our health, we oftentimes spend all our time focusing on one aspect of our health. And this aspect may not be the one which is causing the health imbalance. This is why “test don’t guess” becomes super important - we want to know our weaknesses and also what our body nutritionally needs (protein/fats/(carbs/vitamin/minerals etc.). If we don’t know the facts, then we might be missing the boat completely. It is super unscientific to guess what will make an impact on our health. Health is not simply “move more and eat more greens”. Everyone knows that, yet many of us who follow that basic recommendation, are not at all healthy. We struggle with abdominal fat, infertility issues, fragile bones, migraines, digestive upset whenever we are not eating bland diet foods and in worst case, we get cancer. The key here is to understand the many different factors today that affect health and pin-point which are relevant for our specific situation. We want to focus on our weakest link. Quite often that has nothing to do with eating glutenfree or skipping cake.
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WEBINAR: The Essential role of detoxification in modern life (English only)
How do we navigate a toxic world and what is most important? Join Christina Santini, Human Nutrition and Biological Medicine practitioner to find out what it is our bodies actually need to detox from and how to do it.
ASMALLWORLD Members are invited to join an online webinar on "The Essential Role of Detoxification in Modern Life" with guest speaker Christina Santini as part of our ASMALLWORLD Webinars Series.
Tune in to this Zoom Webinar for ASmallWorld members on Tuesday, March 2nd at 20:00 CET (20:00 Zurich, 19:00 London, 14:00 New York).
To join live click here (membership required).
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