Eating Well in Aging
Health Food: Definition, Category and Function
talk about dietary supplement food today. It is also called dietary or nutritional supplements. In Chinese history, the development of dietary supplement can be traced back to thousands years ago. We can find the historical record to know about this. From these records, there are some differences between eastern and western culture in dietary supplement. For example, the earliest record of using Chinese medicine can be traced back to the Western Zhou Dynasty Western Zhou Dynasty is around 1000 B.C. In Western Culture, around 400 B.C. Hippocrates, the Greek founder of western medicine, had a famous quote.
“Let food be thy medicine, and let medicine be thy food.” At this, we realize that dietary supplement has been used and developed in our history. From earlier medicine record, we can see that the origin of dietary supplements is from plants and herbs.
In Sirach 38:4 “The Lord created medicines from the earth and a sensible man will not despise them.” So, Let’s take some time to explore how dietary supplements come from plants and herbs. Many cases show that dietary supplement extracts from plants and herbs. So I will give you some examples later. First, we will brief through the course outline. Before we start, we have to understand the function of food. A functional food is a food claimed to have an additional function. It often related to health-promotion or disease prevention by adding new ingredients or more of existing ingredients Then, I will introduce the classification of dietary supplements, and the definition of functional food. This definition is rather strict in the past 20 years.
Clinical experiments is required for proving food as functional food. Functional food requires certain conditions such as relieve discomfort or certain symptoms. As a result, the management of functional food becomes important. We will introduce you regulation of dietary supplements from Taiwan government. Most learners are curious about the composition of dietary supplements. So, we will have some time to introduce them. Finally, we will talk about the prospect on dietary supplements.
Three Major Function of Food
The first one is nutrition absorption. Nutrients provide energy to our bodies so we can grow and be active and healthy. In other words, the first function of food is to keep us alive.
The second one is satisfying our psychological needs. Since food provides tastes and flavor, food serves a function to affect one’s sense and behavior. He gives an example of a chocolate cake. It’s delicious but not a must for the body to survive.
The last function is physical adjustments. By consuming nutrient-dense food, our bodies can produce energy to repair themselves. It can prevent us from disease, give us a good complexion and even longer lifespan.
So when we were acknowledged that eating plays a major role in health preservation, we start to value dietary supplements. So foods claim to promote health become popular nowadays.
There are three important functions of food.
The first one is nutrition absorption.
The second one is satisfying our psychological needs.
The last one is physical adjustments
. In this session, I would like to briefly introduce these three functions. Nutrition absorption refers to the function of meeting our basic needs. As we all know, our bodies need food to function properly. The nutrients of foods can provide energy to 60 trillion cells in our bodies so we can grow and be active and healthy.
In other words, the first function of food is to keep us alive. As we are capable of making a comfortable living, we put more focus on how to create a better eating experience.
هناك ثلاث وظائف مهمة للطعام.
الأول هو امتصاص الغذاء.
والثاني هو تلبية احتياجاتنا النفسية.
آخر واحد هو التعديلات الجسدية.
في هذه الجلسة ، أود أن أعرض بإيجاز هذه الوظائف الثلاث. يشير امتصاص التغذية إلى وظيفة تلبية احتياجاتنا الأساسية. كما نعلم جميعًا ، تحتاج أجسامنا إلى الطعام لتعمل بشكل صحيح. يمكن أن توفر العناصر الغذائية للأطعمة الطاقة لـ 60 تريليون خلية في أجسامنا حتى نتمكن من النمو ونكون نشيطين وصحيين. بمعنى آخر ، الوظيفة الأولى للطعام هي إبقائنا أحياء. نظرًا لأننا قادرون على كسب عيش مريح ، فإننا نركز بشكل أكبر على كيفية إنشاء تجربة أكل أفضل.
The mouthfeel, looks, and smell of food play a major role in food selection. And sometimes we are willing to pay more for some food items. For example, it seems that a chocolate cake with edible gold dust on it can signal the wealth and strength of its consumers.
This is the second function of food: satisfying psychological needs Let’s do a simple test. What comes to your mind when I say “Black forest gateau”? You might answer “A cake decorated with chocolate shavings and a cherry.” It’s an interesting brain mechanism that when we see a word label “Black forest gateau”, the image of a chocolate cake immediately comes to our mind. A simple word label can trigger the pleasantness of food. That’s why food producers put more effort into stimulating consumers’ senses. However, according to epidemiologic studies, these efforts could make foods become superstimulus, which is highly related to some chronic illnesses.
For instance, there are many restaurants near Taipei Medical School, every time I pass by these restaurants, I can smell the aroma of braised pork over rice and other food. The aroma of food attracts people to eat. And while having a meal, sometimes the food is so delicious that we can’t help eating more and then increase excess energy intake. Under the circumstance, if we indulge ourselves in food, according to the epidemiologic studies in the past 50 years, we will be vulnerable to chronic diseases. The report of the 10 leading causes of death shows that at least 5 causes are related to our habits, especially our eating habits.
If you keep eating foods which are sources of the supernormal stimulus, you might end up killing by them. When such an unhealthy diet habit become a common problem these days,
the last function of food: physical adjustment, becomes more and more important. People want to figure out whether they can eliminate risk factors by adjusting their diet plan. More and more people pay attention to health preservation. People start to eat nutrient-dense food and even simplify their lifestyle.
This is the last function of food: physical adjustment. By consuming nutrient-dense food, our bodies can produce energy to repair themselves. It can prevent us from disease, give us a good complexion and even longer lifespan.
As was stated above, the three functions of food are: nutrition absorption, satisfying psychological needs, and physical adjustment. It’s practically a human instinct that we all want a good living quality and a long life span. So when we were acknowledged that eating plays a major role in health preservation, we start to value dietary supplements. So foods claim to promote health become popular nowadays.
Health Food Category: Nature Food and Organic Food
First, let’s look at the fist, natural food. Nature food refers to the original state of food. For example, royal jelly, ginseng, lingzhi mushroom, and pollen are in the original states. These food are famous for their health-promotion function and are edible.
The second category is organic food. Organic food is famous in modern society all over the world. Green marketing becomes popular and more consumers prefer organic foods because organics foods ensure high levels of food safety. Broadly speaking, we classify organic foods as a type of health food.
I will explain to you the scientific classification of health good. The term of “health food”is a legal term in Taiwan. I will introduce the development process of health food later. Let’s see the classification first. There are 7 items of health food in general. Nature foods, Organic foods, Diet Foods, Nutritional Supplements, this type is especially used in hospitals. Medical foods, Functional foods, and designer foods. Next, I will introduce each category, definition and function. Natural food refers to the original state of food that we encounter in our daily life. There are certain foods has medical effects and are well known for its function even in ancient time. For example, royal jelly, ginseng, lingzhi mushroom and pollen are in the original states.
These foods are famous for health promotion. Let’s look at royal jelly first. Royal jelly has natural ingredient and it is famous for providing youth-boosting benefits. It is often mentioned royal Jelly can prolong the life span. Ginseng and lingzhi mushroom are also be known for the same effect, extending life span, and even improve our life quality.
In ancient China, their medical effects have been widely recognized and can be used as dietary supplement Whether ginseng and lingzhi mushroom or royal jelly are all in original physical states. They can all be used in traditional Chinese medicine. Legends have it that thousands-year lingzhi and thousands-year Heshouwu can save patients with severe diseases. Although this is fiction, the legends do tell us how people view nature dietary supplements. The second category is organic food. Organic food is famous in modern society all over the world. The origin of organic foods comes from the public concern of avoiding food pollution such as pesticides.
In Taiwan, more and more individual farmers dive into organic farming markets so that consumer can have a better food quality safety guarantee. Organic food especially focuses on the growing process, food crops variety Improvement, land cultivation and microbial control. Organic food means there is no pesticide or chemical fertilizer during the growing process. Green marketing becomes popular and more consumers prefer organic foods because organics foods ensure high levels of food safety. Broadly speaking, we classify organic foods as a type of health food.
Health Food Category: Special Diet Food, Nutritional Supplements, Medical Food
The third one is a special diet plan designed by doctors or dietitians to offer patients a healthy balanced diet. Basically, nature foods, organic foods, and diet foods are all in the form of original state. Diet foods can be altered to accommodate the special needs of patients. For example, if an old lady accidentally broke her bones after a fall, then the doctor and the dietitian could write prescriptions for her to recuperate at home. In this case, the diet designed by dietitian will includes high-calories, high-calcium diet for this old lady with fractures needs to help her bones to rebuild. Therefore, the diet plan built out by the doctor or the dietitian will focus on the key nutrients such as calcium and protein.
This is the definition of diet foods. They are supplied to aid recovery, and improve the prognosis of patients. The next one is the one that we are familiar with. Nutritional supplement. Nutritional supplements are popular in the USA and in European countries. They are products that supplement nutrients to promote health. Common supplements include vitamins or minerals. Nutritional supplements usually serve in the form of tablets or capsules. Vitamins and minerals are common ingredients. Nutritional supplements can help assure you get adequate nutrients your body needs but they can not replace complete meals. This is what I hope you can keep in mind. That’s why we also call them dietary supplements.
Next, we are going to talk about health foods, which refer to medical foods. These foods are intended to meet distinctive nutritional requirements of certain disease by changing the unfavourable contents in foods for those patients. We know that patients with diabetes need to manage their diet more carefully than others. Many people may think diabetics can only eat bland diets. So food manufacturers have developed some products with good taste but won’t cause blood sugar to spike rapidly. For example, sugar substitute, low-sodium foods. There are also medical foods for cancer patients. They have different nutrient requirements from diabetics. Patients with cancer need more protein and other special nutrients during chemotherapy or radiotherapy.
These foods for patients who have distinctive nutritional requirements need to pass the clinical trial process before obtaining the certification. So health foods or medical foods should be regulated by the government before marketing. Famous medical food, for example, thiamine for elderly and sugar substitutes for diabetics are all common medical foods. As mentioned, health foods(medical foods) are foods that part of the content has been changed without changing food taste. Removing those elements that could be harmful for those patients and can be consumed by people with distinctive nutritional requirements
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