Fibre is an important part of your food and health. It is also known as roughage. Earlier it was not considered important or useful for our body and health. But now Researchers believe, with more and more research showing that a high-fiber diet may help prevent cancer, heart disease, and other serious ailments, roughage has started to get some respect. And suggests that we should be eating at least 25 grams of fiber per day, instead of the 12 grams most people are eating.

Helps in Weight loss: Well, it is said that fiber serves as the perfect way to reduce your appetite. This can be attributed to the fact that fibrous foods also known as cellulose and hemicelluloses, occupy a large space of your stomach, thus making you feel full and thereby enable you to avoid overeating. When you eat whole grain food, your hunger is satisfied faster. When you fill up on high fiber foods like whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and nuts, you are less likely to have room for high-fat, low-fiber foods with high calorie count. When you eat fewer calories by including fiber in your diet, you can lose weight or maintain a healthy weight.

It Purifies blood: Fibre lowers your blood cholesterol level, by removing bile acids that digest fat. It also takes the responsibility of regulating your blood sugar. Also your risk factor of falling prey to kidney diseases is greatly reduced. So, incorporate fiber in your daily meals and derive its ultimate health benefits.

It Reduces the risk of Cancer: It is widely believed that fiber-rich diets would prevent colon cancer. Researchers believed that fiber strands formed a mesh network that grabbed on to cancer-causing substances and flushed them out of the intestines. Then one study also showed that women who ate 26 grams of fiber a day were not less likely to develop colon cancer compared to the study participants who only ate 8.5 grams.

Heart disease: Research published in the September 1999 issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition showed that fiber was a shield against heart disease. In fact, it was shown that women who ate at least 25 grams of fiber per day were 40% less likely to have a heart attack than the women who ate less than 9 grams of fiber a day. This was also true of the men in the studies. They could cut their risk of having a heart attack by 50% by eating a high fiber diet.

Sources: Fiber can be found in many foods: multigrain pancakes, muffins, whole grain bread, kidney beans, fruits, vegetables, and nuts. Whole wheat bread is an excellent source of high fiber. Remember, the darker the color of the vegetables, the richer in nutrients they tend to be. Broccoli, cauliflower and Brussels sprouts - are a healthy choice for meals.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 11th, 2008 at 1:04 pm and is filed under Healthcare. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.