When you feel a stabbing pain in your abdomen making you stop cold in your tracks, clutch that painful part of your body and wishing the suffering would end, then, you may have gallstones or hardened deposits of bile or digestive fluids.
When you go for a medical checkup, odds are, your doctor will tell you that you have high levels of cholesterol in your bile, which is found in your gallbladder. Hardened bile eventually leads to gallstones.
The main culprit behind the whopping 80 percent of gallstone cases is high cholesterol, according to The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. Gallstones cause inflammation in the gallbladder making you nauseous and feel excruciating pain.
The most common type of gallstones is what doctors call cholesterol gallstones. It is mostly composed of undissolved cholesterol from foods rich in saturated fats. On the other hand, there is also another type called Pigment Gallstones. This type of gallstones is formed when the bile has excessive amounts of bilirubin, a compound formed in the liver.
These two types of gallstones equally need medical attention before it does more damage. The sad part of this situation is most people who suffer from disease turn to synthetic drugs which could hurt some vital organs of the body and do more harm than good.
Natural is Best
There’s an alternative way of treating and preventing gallstones, and you can do it the natural way with the help of Vitamin E.
It has been proven in a study on 582 people with a median age of 62, with 38.5 percent of whom are women. The researchers took blood samples from each person in said the population and then measured their total lipoprotein (LDL) including the two types of vitamin E – alpha and gamma-tocopherol. The next step they did was measure the link between Vitamin E blood levels and gallstone diseases. They also did the same for cholesterol/vitamin E levels and gallstones.
The researchers found out that the imbalance between free radicals and the body’s capacity to deal with its harmful effects – or what they call oxidative stress – leads to gallbladder disease. It is further shown in the study that vitamin E helped protect the body from oxidative stress, thus, lowering the risk of gallstone ailments. It was also proven that low levels of vitamin E lead to oxidative stress in people suffering from this disease.
One of the hanging questions left for scientists to uncover in their upcoming studies is to what extent does vitamin E prevent a person from having gallstone formation.
Knowing that vitamin E helps reduce and prevent gallstones is already enough for the moment. This information will help a lot of people suffering from this disease or has a history of this illness in the family. It will also inspire people to look for alternative and natural sources of healing and prevention instead of relying on costly and harmful synthetic drugs.
Natural Sources of Vitamin E
When it comes to natural sources of vitamin E, these foods below will keep you healthy and strong.
- Spinach
- Sweet Potatoes
- Avocado
- Sunflower seeds
- Almonds
- Olive oil
- Butternut squash
- Trout
- Palm oil
- Wheat germ
At around three inches long and 1.5 inches wide, our gallbladder can be considered small compared to other organs in our body, but the part it plays in keeping our body healthy is huge. We can’t digest fatty foods in the small intestines without this tiny organ. Gallstones may lead to more threatening diseases like liver damage and pancreatitis because is it blocking the gallbladder – making it less efficient in its role.
Make sure to always take good care of this tiny but essential part of our body because if you don’t, it will really make your life miserable. Treat it well, and it will give you all the good benefits of health. It will give you many years of happiness with your family, friends, and loved ones.
Remember, the key is a healthy diet rich in natural sources of vitamin E and a regulated cholesterol level.
