What You Need To Know About Turmeric, Ginger, And Vascular Health | NP Deidre Arms

Hi everyone, and welcome to Desire Wellness with Nurse Practitioner Deidre. And we are going to be talking about turmeric and ginger. She is a nurse practitioner and co-owner, I believe, of the Desire Wellness group in the Ohio area. So if you're lucky enough to live in that area, you might be able to see Nurse Practitioner Deidre in person. But at the very least, we are very lucky to have her streaming around the world right now with some amazing information today on turmeric and ginger, two amazing anti-inflammatory elements that we love, but we want to know, throughout this journey, should we be getting it in supplements? Should we be getting it in raw, real food? And so she's going to be answering those questions for us. You might even see a recipe that may include one or two of those ingredients. So Nurse Practitioner Deidre, thank you again for joining us. Thank you, glad to be here. So how do we want to tackle this really big subject? I mean, first off, why turmeric and ginger? Why are we focusing an entire episode on these two in particular? I would say the anti-inflammatory properties of it are really helpful for cardiovascular and pads. So I think it's a good place to start. Turmeric's one of the most studied herbs out there. And sometimes we get a lot of conflicting information. So just trying to make it a little more palatable for everybody to understand. Palatable. Good one. Definitely, we want things that are palatable. So should we approach, I want to take each one maybe separately at first and then go into some of the joint components, but should we tackle turmeric first? That sounds great, yeah. So let's start with, what are the primary active compounds in turmeric that contribute to cardiovascular health? So turmeric contains curcumin. So that's primarily the bioactive compound that's in it, and it's responsible for most of the health benefits. It actually, in turmeric, only 5% of it is curcumin. So when you're eating it or using the plant source there, but it's been extensively studied because of anti-inflammatory, antioxidants, and those both have a positive effect on cardiovascular impact. So- You know, what's funny is that I have turmeric sitting here and I always look for one with curcumin, but I don't even know what curcumin is. That's just the bioactive compound in it. Yeah. Really? Yeah, it's the bioactive part of the turmeric, and it makes up 5% of the turmeric. Wow, okay. So how might turmeric potentially benefit people with peripheral artery disease? Same as cardiovascular? Yeah, it can improve blood flow by reducing inflammation and oxidative stress in the arteries, and those are kind of common factors in PAD. Also helps support the endothelial function, and that's essential for your vascular health as well. Can you go into just a little bit deeper because, you know, everyone always throws around anti-inflammatory, anti-inflammatory. Can you explain the anti-inflammatory properties of turmeric and how they might actually impact vascular health? Is there any mechanism of action that we know of? There actually is. With it being the most studied, it's easy to find research on turmeric, but it inhibits your inflammatory pathways by blocking NFKB. So that's a protein that controls the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines in the body. So when it reduces, like, the inflammation could protect us against arterial damage and plaque buildup. So that's what the key issues are in PAD and other cardiovascular conditions. So that's what it's doing. It's really inhibiting and blocking that NFKB. So you mentioned there are a lot of studies that have been done. Can you talk about some of those studies that show the significant improvements in particular in cardiovascular health with regards to turmeric consumption? Yes, so studies shown that we have improved endothelial function and reduced cholesterol levels and decreased inflammation. And for instance, there was one published in atherosclerosis, thrombosis, and vascular biology that showed that curcumin supplementation improved vascular function in postmenopausal women. So that's just one of the many studies that are out there, one that I kind of made note of to talk about today. Are there any, I mean, sometimes you kind of think and you hear this all the time. You can have too much of a good thing. Are there any potential risks or side effects of using turmeric supplements, especially for those with existing heart conditions? Yeah, so turmeric is generally safe, but high doses can cause GI symptoms like nausea or diarrhea. And it can also interact with blood thinning medication, so warfarin, so there's a potential of increasing the risk of bleeding with that. So you would really want to be talking to your provider if you were going to take turmeric in on that medicine. Yeah, my dad was actually, when he went on the dual therapy, he was on antiplatelets and he was on anticoagulants. They took him off both turmeric and his omegas, so his fish oil. So it's definitely something that, that's one of the reasons why doctors always ask you, what supplements are you on? So many of the doctors, they don't talk about supplements or like to talk about supplements and don't focus a lot of their research on supplements, but what they do know is when certain supplements do interfere with your prescribed medicines. And someone to also check with is your pharmacist. So if your doctor has not, or your clinician has not talked about any of the potential interactions, take your list of supplements such as turmeric, such as fish oil, and even ginger, and go to your pharmacist and say, hey, any of these supplements interact with any of these medications. So just a little fallback, extra safety that you might wanna double check. So is it better to consume though, is it better to consume turmeric as a supplement or actually in food form? Can you go over the pros and cons of each? Yeah, so supplements offer a really concentrated dose of curcumin, right? But it might not be easily absorbed. So you want to look for formulations with black pepper or piperine to help enhance the absorption when they're in supplement form. When it comes to food, natural turmeric is absorbed more slowly, but it offers a range of beneficial compounds, but you need to consume large amounts to match the supplement. And so that's why like some people will do like, add a little sprinkle or a piece of the turmeric to a smoothie shake, things like that, or do a turmeric shot. But when you're doing it natural, you need much, much more to get the benefit of the anti-inflammatory that's in a supplement. Oh, that's a little frustrating. Well, you know what? Actually, if I would have known that before I started making my own turmeric chai tea, and then I spilt it all over our carpeting. Nice and orange. I didn't know you could actually paint carpet. You can strip it and then you can repaint it. I had to do that. And it took me hours and hours and hours over the course of a few days to get that whole process completed. And I have never made another cup in two years of the turmeric chai tea. And it was so delicious. One of the doctors from India would prescribe this tea that he would make every morning for himself. He would prescribe it for patients. Oh, it's really delicious. Right? I got it from one of my patients. I was like, this is amazing. It was more satisfying than having coffee. And nope, I don't do it anymore. I literally, I'm such a klutz. I'll knock it right over again. You might have to add the turmeric outside when you're sitting outside. Oh, yes. I'll just say the dog did it when it spilled. Okay, so those, do you have an exact amount? I mean, you say that you need to consume definitely more if you are consuming it in food. I mean, how much more, how much of turmeric should be consumed each day to see any sort of potential benefits? So some of the clinical trials that they've used have used doses of 500 to 2000 milligrams of turmeric daily. And it depends on what brand you're using. You can look at their research, but you want to use a high quality turmeric supplement. Okay, so this is for supplements? Yeah. Okay. But if you're talking about food form, you know, you're thinking, so to achieve the potential benefit, you want to aim for about a teaspoon, that's two to three grams of turmeric powder a day. And so when it's consumed with that black pepper or fat, then the curcumin's bioavailability increases. So that black pepper and a little bit of fat, those together can really help that. Okay, but that's not, so I don't need to bother. It's really tough to deal with peeling the turmeric and cutting it up. And, you know, when I put it in the blender, it ends up, once I cook it up, it stains my pot and then it stains my Vitamix. Yeah, and you can get the powder and use it. Like some people use it already ground into the powder. And that'll do the same thing, stain everything, turn it all yellow. That's true, yeah. At least people go, okay, I know you're healthy. They can walk in, look at the Vitamix and go, I see the stain, that's a good stain. It's not dingy, that's good health. That's right. Okay, so which supplements? I'm thinking that now that we're talking, I mean, it's nice to add it to a little bit of curry or whatever and that kind of thing. But if you really wanna get that, you know, power-packed bunch of anti-inflammatories, we're gonna go for the supplements. So let's go into details on the supplements. Again, the dosages, the forms, what you wanna make sure is on that bottle, any brands that seem to be better than others, any tips on making sure that it's not bad if it's been on a store shelf too long. Any of that information is helpful. So looking for 500 to 2,000 milligrams of curcumin in the supplement. So it might say tumeric on it, but turn that around and see how much actual curcumin is bioavailable in the supplement. Some of the brands that I'm familiar with and that I would use are what we call physician grades. So what they say they have in it, they've been tested. Thorne is one, Pure Encapsulations, Designs for Health, Orthomolecular. Those brands are much higher quality. Those are the ones I'm used to using and looking at. So you would definitely want to just look for the curcumin in it, looking at how much of that is available, high quality that there's not other fillers in. Sometimes people will have food sensitivities and not realize their supplements have a filler that they have a sensitivity to, such as gluten, soy, things like that. So I always look at that piece of it as well. And is it the tumeric extract? Do you want the curcumin extract? Yeah. Just want to make sure. And how does, you know, I know you mentioned this a little bit in the beginning, but I just want to drive home again, like how does combining a tumeric with black pepper affect its absorption and effectiveness? I mean, I know this sounds stupid, I actually was thinking that maybe you were going to say that the curcumin was the black pepper, but black pepper, it's different because that is not on mine. So I'm going to have to get a different tumeric supplement. So when you combine tumeric with black pepper, it enhances the curcumin's bioavailability due to that piperine, which can increase your absorption of it up to 2000%. So it doesn't mean that you're not getting absorption of what you have, but if you are really wanting to take less and pack a punch, you're looking for one that tumeric with black pepper. Okay. So let's move on. I think we covered tumeric and then we can get into maybe some, how we can incorporate tumeric and maybe ginger together in the diet at the end, but let's get into ginger. What do you think? I'm ready to roll with ginger. Yeah. Because this is my favorite. I love ginger. And I, in fact, I go to Trader Joe's and I get this powdered ginger there and I absolutely love it. And I add a little bit of agave or I have a lot of allergies, so I try and incorporate in some local honey into it for myself because it helps. It seems to help with my local allergies in certain seasons. But so I get that just the natural powder. So I'm curious, what are the key active ingredients or components in ginger that may support heart and vascular health? So that would be the gingerols and the shogols. Those compounds are known for the anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties that benefit heart health by lowering oxidative stress and improving circulation. Okay. So that's how, especially with peripheral artery disease in particular, which is that restricted blood flow in the legs. So it improves, ginger actually improves the circulation in the legs with that. So how might ginger though affect the blood pressure as well and is there any sort of recommended dosage for this purpose? Yeah. So that's a great question because it can help lower blood pressure by acting as a natural vasodilator. So it opens up the vessel, helping to relax that blood vessel. And research suggests that daily two to four grams of ginger may have a modest blood pressure lowering effect. So that's what we're seeing. Now here's what's interesting is that for peripheral artery disease patients, a lot of these patients are prescribed a vasodilator and it's known as Pletal or Celostazole. I think there's even maybe another one, but that one is the main one. And it works, a study shows it works in 30% of patients. And when it works, it really, really works to help improve the claudication and the walking distance in peripheral artery disease patients. The problem is, is that it doesn't work in most patients. And if it doesn't work, you don't want to take it because the side effects can be wretched. So ginger, if it's considered a vasodilator, I mean, I'm sure it's not as strong as some sort of prescription drug, but it might help with claudication. Right. And especially like when you're looking to only need a modest reduction in lowering of the blood pressure and everything, that would be somebody who could consider that as well. So what are the potential contraindications for using ginger, particularly for people, again, on blood thinners or other heart medications in particular? Well, it really can interact with blood thinning medications because it might increase the risk of bleeding. So any anti-inflammatories, that's kind of a statement that we say, even with over-the-counter anti-inflammatories, right? Can interact with this. So you always want to just make sure you're consulting your doctor with what you're actually taking that's a blood thinner and you're dosing to see if you can be taking ginger in this higher dose. Like if you're eating it in a meal or something, that's a little bit different than if you are like supplementing in these higher doses to get the effect. So I'm imagining that that answered my next question just a little bit. Is it more beneficial to consume ginger as a supplement or in its natural food form? Can you go over any advantages or disadvantages of each? Yeah, so when you supplement, it kind of provides a standardized dose, but it might not offer the full spectrum of ginger's beneficial compounds. So in the natural form, consuming it fresh or dried provides a broader range of the active compounds. But again, to get a therapeutic dose, you're having to have larger amounts of that. So it's not like taking just a tiny little piece and chewing on it. Like you need to really be incorporating these in your diet to get that effect. Yeah, so those who prefer to use fresh ginger, how much, I'm afraid to ask, how much should be consumed daily to see any potential cardiovascular benefits, if at all? One to two teaspoons of grated fresh ginger a day is what's suggested to see the potential cardiovascular benefits. That doesn't seem so bad, actually. But when you ask most people if they're adding ginger into their diet at all, it's not daily, hardly at all, and definitely not two teaspoons of it. But you're right, one to two teaspoons seems like a small dose. It's just getting, you either like ginger or you don't. So just as we went over with turmeric, if you're going after those ginger supplements, what forms or dosages do you actually recommend? Are there any specific brands, types, considerations that we wanna make sure of on the bottle? I know that my dad on his says raw ginger. Yeah, so a powdered ginger form is fine, is what's typically in supplement form. You can find a ginger powder. There's lots of brands, the same ones that I mentioned before, but even that Now Foods has a great brand. They're usually higher quality of ginger supplementation. You're looking for about one to three grams of that in a supplement form. I often use at least two grams if somebody has pain. So I'm looking to, like if you're having pain or joint pain inflammation, I will add, like make it at least two grams if we're supplementing. Wow, and the thing is, and I think that you've made this point in a very passive way throughout this entire session. This is something that you need to do every single day if this is something that you want to potentially see any sort of benefits from. This isn't a, well, I'm having a little bit of ginger in my tea once a week. This is a, okay, we got to do it on a regular basis in order to see any sort of benefits. What I usually talk to my patients about is supplements are meant to supplement your diet, right? And if on a day you are eating that, that day you don't really need to take the supplement form of it either. It doesn't have to be both those days, but like most of us aren't good about getting all the things that we need to support anti-inflammation and cardiovascular. So, you know, does preparation matter when it comes to ginger, fresh, dried, cooked? Does it impact ginger's health benefits? And I think I should ask the same about turmeric as well. So with the ginger, it retains most of its nutrients if it's fresh. And then when you dry or cook it in those forms, you can have a little bit of reduced potency of it. Although the dried ginger offers the Shogo compound that has anti-inflammatory properties. So you still are getting a good bit of what you need through the dried as well as the fresh. And same with like turmeric, you know, having the fresh, but when you do the powdered form, like you can get much more concentration than doing the fresh as well. So sometimes that is the benefit of using the powdered or dried forms. So are there any synergistic effects when using both turmeric and ginger for cardiovascular health? I mean, if they're both anti-inflammatory, they seem like they could be incredibly synergistic. Right, that's why I wanted to talk about them together. So when you're comparing them, both turmeric and ginger have that anti-inflammatory and circulation improving properties, which make them beneficial. But turmeric might be slightly more potent due to its curcumin impact on the endothelial functions and ginger is more effective in improving blood circulation. So that synergistic is combining the two to amplify anti-inflammatory antioxidants effects. So you're offering more comprehensive cardiovascular benefit. So we all want the magic pill and we all want to see the benefits yesterday. So how long does it typically take to actually see potential benefits from regular consumption of these spices and are there any studies to show it's measurable? So the measurable benefits within four to eight weeks, depending on the dosage and how you're adding it to your diet. So looking at the numbers, decreasing inflammatory markers, you want to do four to eight weeks. I actually myself used it and had a huge reduction in inflammatory markers, just to see, like I did before and after labs to monitor myself, but that's how you would look. You would look at your, your CRP is kind of your basic inflammatory marker that you can kind of look at when you're doing things to decrease inflammation and see if there's improvement, so. So are there, I love that you tested that on yourself and that's actually what we did. And we talk a lot on here about that amforanoeva.com forward slash Marin. They're olive oil that my dad and I did the experiment with him and his CRP and knocking it down using that in combination with the turmeric with the curcumin. And so it had a huge impact, but that's, you know, what was our whole thing and that we really wanted to see if it had in fact a measurable impact. And for my dad's case, it did. But, you know, grander studies, are there any ongoing clinical trials or recent research developments regarding either turmeric or ginger or both for cardiovascular health that you find particularly promising? So they have some recent studies that focus on curcumin's role in reducing arterial stiffness and improving vascular function and some research that explores kind of the potential in reducing blood pressure and cholesterol profiles if you're using ginger. So those seem, you know, promising watching those. Research on turmeric is just, it's widely out there. So just kind of monitoring, watching like what benefits people are getting in these studies. I love the research on these herbs. But, you know, some people think that traditional medicine doesn't really, and pharmaceutical companies, you know, don't want to focus on, you know, a lot of these natural supplements and their benefits because, you know, where's the money, right? But if you think about it, red yeast rice, something natural, you can even buy it as a regular supplement, but they've gone above and beyond and now they're called statins. They're a key ingredient in statins. And so I would almost imagine going forward that maybe at some point that turmeric could be, yes, found on the store shelves, but there might be a grander form in combination with something else that could be a prescribed medication at some point. Right, well, most medications, I mean, they have a plant compound in them. So that's what we're looking at when medications are made. So maybe that's promising. We might be seeing that in the future. So can you recommend, and now, I mean, I'm really excited. I'm sure everybody's excited about incorporating this into their diet. What are some specific diet strategies for incorporating both turmeric and ginger into a heart-healthy diet? And maybe you have a recipe that might include both? Yeah, so incorporating your ginger, you can do turmeric ginger teas. You can add that with honey or black pepper. You can do smoothies. You can do soups and dishes. But one of our patients really sent us a great recipe this week that had some, like, there is ginger in this recipe. There is black pepper in this recipe. And so, oh, there it is. Okay, the chickpea curry here. And like, I was really looking at this because the question really is, what are the heart-healthy ingredients in this? And so when you see this here, that red onion, right? So onions are rich in quercetin. They're an antioxidant, and they can help reduce blood pressure and inflammation. So that helps improve heart health. We can't say enough about olive oil. I should let you talk about the benefits of olive oil here, Kim. Hand-picked, first harvest, cold-pressed, extra virgin. And if you can get it from Amphora Nueva, .com forward slash Marin, A-M-P-H-O-R-A Nueva, N-U-E-V-A .com forward slash Marin. No, they don't pay me. But they have the olive oil that has literally been clinically proven three years straight to be the healthiest in the world. So that speaks volumes. You definitely want it. If you're gonna go for it, go for it with them. Right, and then the garlic in it, like garlic's known to help improve blood pressure, reduce cholesterol levels. It also contains allicillin, and that helps prevent the hardening of the arteries and improves overall cardiovascular function. And then we've talked about ginger here over and over. So this recipe has ginger. So as you see it, we're building on this recipe, which I feel like it's such an awesome recipe to share with everybody. Those red chilies, they contain capsaicin. We know that you can go over the counter and buy capsaicin, and it helps lower blood pressure, reduce cholesterol, it improves circulation. So curry powder, which is a blend of spices like turmeric, cumin, and coriander. So when you look at curry powder, it does have turmeric in it. It has cumin and coriander. So the cumin and coriander, those are rich in antioxidants, but also help reduce inflammation. So you can see we're just building, this recipe is building on all of the things that are heart healthy for us.