Girls, boys and breakfast

An informative look at recent Holistic Fitness News

DR KAPLAN'S WEEKLY NEWSLETTER

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'A good breakfast is a good start to the day. 'Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.' 'Full English breakfast, sir?' I've heard all of these statements over and over again. So what is the truth about that meal that breaks our overnight fast? And what should we tell our children?

Well it seems it all depends on whether you are a girl or a boy. Researchers at Ulster University have found that girls, but not boys should be the ones to be encouraged to eat a good breakfast. They found that girls performed better at tests of memory and concentration after eating a breakfast. The actual breakfast that came out tops for girls in the study was beans on toast but I'm not sure we should infer anything from that. What is very interesting is that boys tended to perform better in these tests when still a little hungry or after a very moderate breakfast such as toast without the beans.

Is the 'beer belly' a myth?

It seems that what has been taken for granted for a long time, that beer can give you a bit of a belly, is simply not true. The men in white coats in the Czech Republic studied the drinking habits and the size of their bellies of 2000 men and women. That is a fair sample size so the study is no joke. The researchers found that there is no relation between the amount of beer you quaff and your weight! Even more surprising was their finding that women who drink beer were on balance a bit lighter than those that abstained!

The Triumph of a body builder

I remember Arnold Schwarzenegger's first film. It was about body building and called 'Pumping Iron'. Good stuff actually although those guys really tend to overdo things a tad. So now it seems that brawn might be as important as brain when it comes to running for office, if not more. Well at least in America that is. Today the more 'sculpted' look is in demand and the exercise programme on this site as well as Yoga and Pilates are this way inclined. Still good luck to Arnie, the body-building governor of California.

Homeopathy

Okay, winter is here and so are those dreaded colds. Can we do anything about treating them or better still, preventing them. My grandmother used to say that if you treat a cold it gets better in a week. If you don't treat it, it gets better in 7 days. Still homeopathy does have some ideas about treating colds.

The following should be taken in strength 6c, 4 times a day.

1. Aconite: To be used in the first few hours of a cold only; when you feel that familiar dreaded tickle in the back of the throat. You may just be able to abort a cold if you get in quick enough.
2. Gelsemium: Flu or colds that leave your muscles aching, send shivers down your spine and leave you without taste for food or drink, and even completely thirstless.
3. Bryonia: Can be used for those lingering coughs that come at the tail end of colds.

Herbs and Food Supplements are also frequently used. Vitamin C has long been thought of (but never proven) to help prevent colds. 500mg a day is quite enough though manufacturers may try to persuade you to take much higher doses. As for the fizzy drink variety. No harm in those, but understand that you pay a hefty premium for those bubbles in the water, with no added medicinal effect.

As for herbs, the big herb for increasing resistance to colds is Echinacea. I don't recommend that you take it all winter though. Use it when you have been exposed to a lot of people with colds. Again, as with Vit C, not a lot of proof but a lot of people swear by this one.

Dr Kaplan's personal website is: www.drkaplan.co.uk and his practice website is www.140harleystreet.co.uk and he can be contacted on (020) 7487 3416