Does coffee get a bad rap? Can certain diets reduce inflammation in your body? What mental workouts will boost your brain? Read on for answers in this week’s top stories from Cleveland Clinic 360-5, a site devoted to wellness through mind, body and food solutions.
1. Coffee, Tea and Heart Health
Coffee has a bad reputation when it comes to heart health, while tea is generally accorded special healing properties. We have good news for both coffee and tea drinkers: Neither is bad for the heart. Get answers from leading cardiologists Marc Gillinov, MD, and Steven Nissen, MD.
2. Build Upper Body Strength
If push-ups from your knees are too challenging, build upper-body strength by doing wall push-ups instead. Like regular push-ups, this move will strengthen your arms, shoulders and chest.
3. Get a Boost With Brainteasers
Improving your problem-solving skills can do more than boost brainpower. Solving increasingly difficult puzzles can also help people become more willing to try new things. A new study shows the power of exercising your brain.
4. How Sleep Affects Your Eating Habits
Poor sleep habits may be the reason your pants are snug. A small new study shows that a single night of tossing and turning can put your appetite into overdrive the next day — making food harder to resist. And past research has shown that people who routinely sleep for five hours a night have increased levels of hormones that regulate hunger.
5. Foods to Fight Inflammation
You can tamp down inflammation by selecting complex carbohydrates over simple ones. That easy switch may help reduce levels of C-reactive protein, an inflammation marker associated with heart disease. When groups of overweight people were put on diets that excluded carbohydrates like white rice, sugar, flour and bread while emphasizing carbs like whole grains, legumes and other high-fiber foods, their metabolic profile improved. Not only did their inflammation decrease, a hormone called adiponectin — which helps protect against cancer, diabetes and atherosclerosis — increased.
