Green Pharmacy for Osteoporosis

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Green Pharmacy for Osteoposis JoAnn Guest Nov 05, 2002 14:33 PST Green

Pharmacy for Osteoporosis

 

If you’re looking to consume less protein and more nutrients that help

prevent Osteoporosis, here are the plant foods I’d suggest.

 

Cabbage:

Boron helps raise estrogen levels in the blood, and estrogen helps

preserve bone. In my database, cabbage ranks highest in boron content

among leafy vegetables with 145 parts per million (ppm) on a dry-weight

basis.

 

I eat a lot of coleslaw, and it’s easy to combine cabbage with

high-calcium broccoli, kale, beans and tofu in salads and steamed

vegetable dishes. Cabbage is also a key ingredient in my

Bone-strengthening Broth.

 

Dandelion:

Speaking of boron, dandelion shoots run a close second to cabbage, with

125 ppm. Dandelion also has more than 20,000 ppm of calcium, meaning

that just ten grams (just under seven tablespoons) of dried dandelion

shoots could provide more than 1 mg of born and 200 mgs of calcium.

Dandelion is also a fair source of silicon, which some studies suggest

also helps strengthen bone.

 

Pigweed:

On a dry weight basis, pigweed leaves are one of our best vegetable

sources of calcium, at 5.3 percent. This means that a small serving of

steamed leaves provides a hearty 500 mgs of calcium. Other good plant

sources of calcium in descending order of potency include broad beans,

watercress, licorice, marjoram, savory, red clover shoots, thyme,

Chinese cabbages (bok choy), basil, celery root, dandelion root, and

purslane.

 

Avocado:

As one reputed vegetable source of vitamin D, avocados can help the body

turn calcium into bone. Some people shun avocadoes because they are

fairly high in fat, but if you eat a generally low-fat vegetarian diet,

I don’t see much harm in them, especially if you’re at risk for

osteoporosis. I suggest mashing an avocado into nonfat organic cottage

cheese or organic yogurt so you get your calcium and some vitamin D at

the same time. Avocadoes are also rich in heart healthy vitamin E.

 

Beans:

(Glycine max) and other beans)

Vegetarian and Japanese women have a lower incidence of osteoporosis and

fractures than Western or meat-eating women. The reason, according to

James Anderson, M.D. of the University of Kentucky College of medicine

in Lexington, appears to be that Western diet meat-eaters excrete more

calcium in their urine.

Beans are a good source of protein, but they cause less calcium loss in

the urine than meat. In addition, soybeans and other beans contain

genistein, a plant estrogen (phytoestrogen) that acts like the female

sex hormone in the body.

Pharmaceutical estrogen replacement increases the risk of breast cancer.

Genistein from beans has never shown to increase cancer risk, and I’d be

willing to bet that a diet rich in beans would strengthen bone and

prevent heart disease as well as or equally as well as, estrogen pills.

 

Black Pepper:

According to my database, black pepper contains four anti-osteoporosis

compounds. If you like pepper, you might consider sprinkling it

generously on your avocado or bean soup or salad, assuming that every

little bit helps.

 

Horsetail:

French research suggests that silicon helps prevent osteoporosis and can

be used to treat bone fractures. Horsetail is among the richest plant

sources of this mineral, in the form of the compound monosilicic acid,

which the body can readily use.

Aging and low estrogen levels decrease the body’s ability to absorb

silicon. Some people recommend up to nine 350 mg capsules daily. You

should use this herb only in combination with a holistic practitioner.

If you’re advised to use horsetail tea, add a teaspoon of pure natural

cane sugar to the water along with the dried herb.The sugar will pull

more silicon out of the plant.

Bring it to a boil, then let it simmer for about three hours. Strain out

the leaves, then let the tea cool before drinking.

 

Parsley:

That dark green garnish, which is so often thrown away, instead of

eaten, is generously endowed with boron. It would take about three

ounces of dried parsley to provide the three mgs deemed that is useful

in osteoporosis. That’s more than most people want to consume, but every

sprig helps.

In my database, parsley is also among the highest food sources of

fluorine, another bone strengthener. Freshen your breath, while you save

your bones by routinely eating every sprig of parsley garnish on your

plate in restaurants.

 

I have nothing against calcium supplements but I firmly believe that

everyone should get as much calcium as possible from their foods. It’s

not only possible to do this, it’s better for your bones, because the

mineral strength of bone depends on more than calcium. For calcium to

actually strengthen bones, it must be continued with several other

nutrients that few experts seem to talk about. Phosphorus is

particularly important, but you also need magnesium, boron, zinc,

vitamin D and vitamin A.

You can get all of these nutrients in supplements, but I prefer to get

them the way Nature intended—packaged all together in food!

 

The other news about osteoporosis that few people know is that

high-protein diets leach calcium from bones. Nutrition experts I rely on

suggest that people at risk for osteoporosis limit their protein intake

to no more than one gram of protein per kilogram of body weight, which

translates into around two to three ounces of protein—on the order of

one Amish chicken breast or one Laura’s Lean beef hamburger (hormone and

antibiotic-free-—daily for the average woman.

Most Americans eat considerably more protein than this, running a risk

of calcium loss even if they consume a lot of the mineral.

 

Currently, this disease costs the United States some six billion a year!

My wife Peggy, who is under 65, diagnosed with osteoporosis is doing

well on this diet.

 

James A. Dukes Ph.D.

From the “Green Pharmacy”

 

 

 

JoAnn Guest

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