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The Assistance from Dietary Supplement

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We all know the importance of a balanced diet, but it is still difficult for us to achieve a balanced diet due to the lack of time for cooking or other circumstances. Therefore, many of us have an imbalanced diet more or less. So, what can we do? We can eat some nutritional supplements in an appropriate amount. There are 5 reasons why we need food supplements. The first reason is they can supplement the nutrients we need when our diet is inadequate, such as calcium supplement for the low density of bones. The second is under some medical conditions, our bodies’ need for certain nutrients will increase.
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The third is we need certain nutrients more than others if we have some hobbies, such as exercising, smoking, drinking will cause the increase in some nutrients need. The fourth is the special needs for some nutrients in unhealthy living environments, such as living in a place with serious air pollution or an environment causing lots of stress. The fifth is that we might have poor diets in the past or our physical constitution has changed, like our immunity and detoxification capability decrease. Therefore, we can take these nutritional supplements as prevention for certain symptom such as fatigue, reducing the risk of high blood pressure, high blood sugar, and high blood cholesterol, anemia, and diminution of vision. Appropriate nutritional supplements can also delay our aging.
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These functions are claimed by the 13 healthy foods which are certificated by the Taiwan Ministry of Health and Welfare. This relevance of the balanced diet to our health, we can summarize it in a Japanese saying, Taishitsu wa syokubutsu de tsukuru it means our body can be affected by food. Japan is the nation at the top of the world’s life expectancy. Because they have been taught the importance of healthy diets since they were kids. They can live long and healthy because they value health and balanced diet. Therefore, they have the highest life expectancy. If you are visiting Japan, you can learn this from them.
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Syoku Seikatsu wo taisetsu ni surukodo wa inoji wo taisetsu ni surukodo desu “ taisetsu ni” means value Valuing our diets is equal to valuing our life. I think it’s important that we should take it seriously on what we eat if we value our life. For instance, if we take medicine regularly, including the medication for chronic diseases, we should take vitamin B supplements. Because most of these medicines will cause B vitamins deficiency. If you like to exercise, you should not only increase energy intake but take some B vitamins and vitamin E supplements to maintain overall body function after exercising. In addition, for people who like to drink, they should supplement B vitamins and calcium.
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If you are under lots of stress, you should supplement vitamin C and B vitamins. Besides, if you are exposed to serious air pollution environement, you can take antioxidant supplements, including vitamin C, vitamin E and β-Carotene.

Prof. Hsieh explains 5 reasons why we need food supplements. He elaborates on the 5 situations when one is suggested to use the dietary supplement.

Diet inadequate, medical conditions, hobbies like smoking or drinking, unhealthy living environments, and body physical constitution changed. Dietary supplements can help the prevention of diseases. We will discuss more on dietary supplements in week 4.

In the video, the professor mentions unhealthy hobbies, such as lacking exercising, smoking, or drinking. Have you ever heard of successful cases to change these hobbies? How do they make it?

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Nutrition: Eating to Live Well

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