Long Term Care Insurance Tips

I would like to start out the long term care blog month of May with a discussion about antioxidants. People who are trying to get and stay healthy hear a lot about the need to add antioxidants to your diet, but little media attention is given to explaining what they are, how they work and where you can find natural antioxidants. Today’s discussion is going to answer all of these questions.

First of all, an antioxidant is a molecule that stops or minimizes oxidation of other molecules. Oxidation is a process by which a molecule loses electrons because another oxidizing molecule takes them. This degrades the cell and limits ability to function normally.

An antioxidant works by blocking oxidizing molecules and stopping them from stealing electrons from other molecules. They do this in a couple of ways, however, the most common method is by allowing the oxidizing cell to oxidize the antioxidant molecule instead of other molecules. Your long term care insurance provider will appreciate that you have added antioxidants to your diet because they help to keep your body healthy and they help to prevent systemic diseases.

While there are many antioxidant supplements that you can take, large studies have not found any benefits offered by the processed antioxidants. To get the most from an antioxidant you will want to find a natural source such as tea and fresh fruits and vegetables. There are two main types of natural antioxidants, those that are water soluble and those that are lipid soluble. Water soluble antioxidants include Vitamin C, lipoic acid and glutathione. Lipid soluble antioxidants include carotenes, coenzyme Q and Vitamin E.

Do you have tips on where to find a good source of natural antioxidants? Or have your read about new research on this topic? Let us know what you’ve heard and share what you’ve learned about this health sustaining ingredient and how it will impact your long term care health insurance needs in the future.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 2nd, 2008 at 5:00 pm and is filed under managing your health. 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.