While fad diets may be debunked, according to one specialist, paying attention to your gut isn’t another mere craze. “It definitely isn’t just a trend,” says Dr Megan Rossi, Research Associate at King’s College London. Gut’s sudden rise to prominence as an arbiter of our mental health is due to technological advances, she explains. “We weren’t able to sequence all the bacteria and understand their genetic profiles and their functionality until now,” she explains. Only in the last 10 years has the tech been available to understand the gut’s true potential. “I definitely see the gut as like a second brain,” she says. And, like the brain, we are far from understanding all of its mysteries.
How to cope with anxiety
Dr Rachel Andrew offers her advice for teens struggling with anxiety:
- Seek appropriate help if you feel you need it
- Remind yourself that it only forms a part of your strengths, talents and abilities
- Try and practise mindfulness to stay in the moment, as your anxiety will drive you to constantly think of the future and worst case scenarios
- Try to stay focused on the present and more manageable situations
- Take a break on social media or at least have moments in the day where you switch alerts off.
The study, funded by National Institute for Health Research, tracked 444 patients with “severe health anxiety” at cardiology, gastroenterology, neurology and respiratory departments. While some had genuine health complaints, or had suffered them the past, all had abnormal levels of anxiety. Those given cognitive behavioural therapy saw a significant drop in anxiety levels, five years on so similar death rates to those given standard NHS care, suggesting that counselling did not lead to a failure to discover life-threatening illnesses, researchers found. The hospital food is another issue as patients sometimes are unable to eat what is provided. Lots of tons of food is wasted by NHS because is unsuitable for dietary needs in certain situations or patient too ill to eat that sort of food provided. Holistic approach to good diet will reduce some illnesses compounded by junk food or starvation. Healthy food education must extend to manufacturers also and start early from childhood. Convenience foods are good but cannot be totally depended on solely for nutrients. Fresh food quickly prepared contains ‘live’ nutrient than the one stored for years before being eaten.Scientists filmed this picture seen here showing bad bacteria eating the healthy brain bacteria. In other words the poor diet can create toxic bacteria to damage brain cells, cause some mood swings or depression. Food is medicine to healthy body so provides energy and strength. On the other bad junk food destroys the body slowly causing long-term diseases. Pay attention to your food because you are what you eat. There is no excuse to neglect the body because of healthier foods now abundantly available to choose from. A little effort makes good difference to mood swings and improve serotonin. It’s better to eat well without the plastic containers damaging earth and the environment because people think they are too busy to cook. Time spent travelling, queueing in long lines for food can be easily used to cook the simple healthy home-made meals. The TV show proved it took longer in some cases to wait for good ordered than to make a freshly prepared meal. So many step by step recipes are available to use to follow and cook meals. A Can’t cook won’t cook TV programme also guided people to turn simple ingredients into gourmets meals fit for a Kings, Queens, or superstars. Experiment with your own favourite foods and cut down the sugar, fat and salt in some foods. It can be done as many people changed diets, felt better and lost weight as a bonus and a glowing skin feeling happier too.
- Gut Bacteria and Autism
- Due to a three-way relationship between the brain, gut and hormone cortisol
- This mechanism is thought to influence how ‘messages’ are communicated
- Bacteria in faeces influences hormones in gut bacteria
- Further studies on relationship can determine help symptoms
- Researchers analyzed gut and brain connections for humans to learn more about symptoms.
Gut bacteria can be linked to autism as a new research suggests. Pathogens in the stomach alter brain’s development and may increase an individual’s risk of suffering from the spectrum disorder, a study implies. A three-way relationship between brain, gut and stress hormone cortisol appears to influence ‘messages’ communicated in the body, which may result in autistic symptoms as research adds. Lead author Austin Mudd from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, said: ‘Changes during infancy can have profound effects on brain development, and its possible the microbiome collection of bacteria, fungi and viruses inhabiting gut plays a role in this process. The researchers further studies required for 3way mechanism to determine autism symptoms. But can be reversed by strengthening the gut’s lining. Study author Dr Qinrui Li from Peking University said ‘Efforts to restore gut microbiota to a healthier person has been shown to be really effective. Its a review of taking probiotics, prebiotics, changing diet for example to gluten and casein-free diets have a positive impact on symptoms. The study carried out by researchers analyzed the brain and gut developments. Researchers examined faeces to determine if bacteria in stools influences compounds in the blood and brains. The Key findings revealed these results that the presence of the bacteria Bacteroides and Clostridium in faeces is associated with higher level substances involved in cell signalling myo-inositol. Bacteroides is also linked to increased amounts of a substance, called creatine, in brain. The bacteria Butyricimonas was found to be linked to the amino acid n-acetylaspartate (NAA) in brain, while Ruminococcus lowered NAA’s cognitive concentration. The presence of such bacteria further influence levels of hormones cortisol and serotonin and determined by gut bacteria. Mr Mudd said: ‘Changes in neurometabolites in infancy can have profound effects on brain development so possible that the microbiome or collection of bacteria, fungi, and viruses inhabiting gut plays a role in this process.’ The findings were published in the journal Gut Microbes.