Cinnamon Can Lower Blood Sugar

Cinnamon Can Lower Blood Sugar


What It Is

Cinnamomum cassia is the dried bark of evergreen trees cultivated throughout Asia, though we know it best as the powder that flavors apple pie and other goodies.

What Traditional Medicine Says

As early as 2700 BC, Chinese herbalists treated diarrhea and kidney disorders with cinnamon. Later, Greek healers and practitioners of Indian Ayurvedic medicine valued it as a remedy for digestive problems.

What We Know

Cinnamon may help lower cholesterol and triglycerides. Pakistani researchers gave 60 type 2 diabetics with borderline-high lipid levels a daily placebo pill or one with 1 to 6 g of cinnamon. After 40 days, those in the cinnamon group saw their cholesterol levels fall by at least 13% and their triglyceride levels by at least 23%. The placebo had no effect.

Cinnamon's unique healing abilities come from three basic types of components in the essential oils found in its bark. These oils contain active components called cinnamaldehyde, cinnamyl acetate, and cinnamyl alcohol, plus a wide range of other volatile substances.

Anti-Clotting Actions

Cinnamaldehyde (also called cinnamic aldehyde) has been well-researched for its effects on blood platelets. Platelets are constituents of blood that are meant to clump together under emergency circumstances (like physical injury) as a way to stop bleeding, but under normal circumstances, they can make blood flow inadequate if they clump together too much.

The cinnaldehyde in cinnamon helps prevent unwanted clumping of blood platelets. (The way it accomplishes this health-protective act is by inhibiting the release of an inflammatory fatty acid called arachidonic acid from platelet membranes and reducing the formation of an inflammatory messaging molecule called thromboxane A2.)

Cinnamon's ability to lower the release of arachidonic acid from cell membranes also puts it in the category of an "anti-inflammatory" food that can be helpful in lessening inflammation.

Anti-Microbial Activity

Cinnamon's essential oils also qualify it as an "anti-microbial" food, and cinnamon has been studied for its ability to help stop the growth of bacteria as well as fungi, including the commonly problematic yeast Candida. In laboratory tests, growth of yeasts that were resistant to the commonly used anti-fungal medication fluconazole was often (though not always) stopped by cinnamon extracts.

Cinnamon's antimicrobial properties are so effective that recent research demonstrates this spice can be used as an alternative to traditional food preservatives. In a study, published in the August 2003 issue of the International Journal of Food Microbiology, the addition of just a few drops of cinnamon essential oil to 100 ml (approximately 3 ounces) of carrot broth, which was then refrigerated, inhibited the growth of the foodborne pathogenic Bacillus cereus for at least 60 days.

When the broth was refrigerated without the addition of cinnamon oil, the pathogenic B. cereus flourished despite the cold temperature. In addition, researchers noted that the addition of cinnamon not only acted as an effective preservative but improved the flavor of the broth.(October 1, 2003)

What New Research Shows

Cinnamon can help rein in blood sugar. German researchers collected blood from 65 adults with type 2 diabetes who then took a capsule containing the equivalent of 1 g of cinnamon powder or a placebo three times a day for 4 months. By the end, cinnamon reduced blood sugar by about 10%; the placebo users improved by only 4%. Compounds in cinnamon may activate enzymes that stimulate insulin receptors.

Spice your Weight Loss!

Spice your Weight Loss!

A number of factors can contribute to the development of obesity. These take effect through a range of different mechanisms but, in all cases, the consequence is the storage of surplus energy as excessive quantities of body fat. Spices such as chilies, garlic and fenugreek can help to check weight gain and reduce obesity.

Fat deposition is a defensive mechanism that enables the storage of energy when food is abundant, thereby increasing the chances of survival during times of food scarcity and famine. In earlier times those individuals who were efficient at storing fat were more likely to survive food shortages. Unfortunately, during times of plenty we retain this innate capacity to store fat and what was once an advantage for the efficient energy accumulators has now become a health risk for them.

Viewed simplistically, obesity is caused by too much energy intake, in the form of food, and not enough energy output, in the form of basic metabolic processes and exercise. However, the reasons that so many of us become overweight or obese are a little more complex than this straightforward equation suggests. Although a sedentary lifestyle and the availability of cheap, high-energy carbohydrate and fat-laden foods are the principal causes of obesity, there are sometimes other aggravating factors. These are diverse and include a genetic predisposition; lifestyle-related factors such as stress and sleep deprivation; psychological problems that manifest themselves as eating disorders; underlying illness; certain medications; a diet dominated by high glycaemic index foods; and habitual dieting with its attendant weight cycling. It has been suggested recently that certain virus infections can increase a tendency to put on weight.

In many cases these factors work by interfering with our appetite control mechanisms, which are partially responsible for the maintenance of normal weight. The failure of appetite (satiety) control is often directly responsible for obesity and can exacerbate and entrench the condition once it has developed. Satiety control mechanisms may also be dampened as a consequence of obesity which has been caused by other factors. A number of mechanisms are involved in this complex regulatory system, and a malfunction of any one of these may result in the consumption of excess food.

The senses of smell and taste are two of the most important of the appetite control mechanisms. When we smell or eat food, receptors in the nose are stimulated by food odor molecules and convey these signals to the satiety centre in the brain. By monitoring the intensity of these signals, the satiety centre is able to gauge when we have had enough to eat. As a result, individuals who have a poor sense of smell or who suffer from a complete loss of the sense of smell tend to eat more than those with a normal sense of smell. Unsurprisingly, strongly flavored and seasoned foods - which often owe this property to spices - stimulate the satiety centre far more effectively than bland foods, and we tend to eat less of the former as a result.

Distention of the stomach by food also induces the release of hormones that act as appetite suppressants and some foods, particularly the spices, have the same effects, even in the absence of stomach distention. A group of hormones, one of which is leptin, are produced by fat tissue and are thought to play an important role in appetite regulation.
Spices have a number of properties that make them effective agents to help prevent and treat obesity. In their role as appetite suppressants, spices are known to work in three principal ways.

1. Appetite suppression:

The strong odors and flavors common to all spices rapidly stimulate the satiety center in the brain, thereby diminishing feelings of hunger. Certain spices, such as chilies, act by simulating the release of appetite suppressing hormones in the intestine. Garlic meanwhile reduces the appetite by increasing the brain's sensitivity to leptin.

2. Increase metabolic rate:

Some spices stimulate the nervous system to release hormones like adrenalin. These hormones speed up the metabolic rate which, in turn, helps "burn off" surplus fat. Capsicums (including chilies and red peppers) and garlic have both been shown to increase the metabolic rate, in some cases by up to 10 percent. Clinical trials have demonstrated that these spices can be effective both in protecting against weight gain and assisting in weight loss. In the capsicum family, more than one phytochemical is known to be responsible for this effect: capsaicin (found in high amounts in chilies) and the less spicy capsiate (found in the milder paprika and red peppers) both increase metabolic rate.

Capsaicin, the compound that gives red pepper its heat, could inhibit the growth of fat cells, says a new laboratory study.

"The results of this study clearly showed that capsaicin could inhibit the population growth and the induction of apoptosis [programmed cell death] in 3T3-L1 preadipocytes [cells that can be stimulated to form fat cells]," wrote Gow-Chin Yen and Chin-Lin Hsu in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.

The researchers, from the National Chung Hsing University in Taiwan, note that previous studies have suggested that obesity may be reduced by preventing immature fat cells (adipocytes) from developing into mature cells, and other studies have shown that capsaicin can decrease the amount of fat tissue and decrease fat levels in the blood.

3. Reduce fat absorption:

Ginger, fenugreek and garlic all have the ability to reduce the absorption of fat from the intestines.

The diverse ways in which spices act provide the ideal combination of tools to help with the natural treatment of obesity.

In conjunction with a sensible weight loss program, they are useful natural treatments for obesity and overweight.