By in Nutrition

7 Top Tips for Staying Healthy This Summer Holiday

The summer holidays are here! Here are my 7 top tips on how diet and nutritional supplements can help you stay healthy this summer:

#1 Eat Real Food

The best defence against getting ill on holiday – or in fact at any other time – is a strong immune system, and your diet plays a crucial role in how resilient yours is. Make sure to eat real food (as opposed to junk and processed foods) with lots of fresh fruit and vegetables – much of it raw -, good quality protein, and plenty of good fats from nuts, seeds, olives and oily fish. Sugar and alcohol are immune suppressants and can profoundly affect your ability to protect yourself from disease.

#2 Increase Your Zinc

Zinc is a powerful antioxidant and antiviral nutrient. Foods richest in zinc include oysters, seafood, sea vegetables (seaweed), meat and poultry, nuts and seeds, and unsweetened chocolate (cacao). Diets high in grains impair zinc absorption, so if you eat a fair amount of grain-based foods, you may be zinc deficient.

#3 Protect Your Eyes and Skin

Astaxanthin is an important plant nutrient from the family of carotenoids. It is best known for protecting the eyes from macular degeneration, but it is also thought to help protect the skin from UV damage. Food sources of astaxanthin are salmon, salmon roe, lobster, crab, arctic crab and red seaweed. To benefit from its protective properties, you will need 4 – 8 mg of astaxanthin per day for at least three weeks before as well as during your holiday. It is difficult to get this much from food alone, so you may want to use a supplement (e. g. Higher Nature Astaxanthin and Blackcurrant, 2 – 4 capsules/day). This is a very safe supplement, with no known side effects or interactions. However, if you are on any medication it is advisable to first check with your doctor whether you can take it. NB: Astaxanthin does not replace sun lotion!

#4 Get Your Good Bacteria

Start taking a good quality probiotic supplement. Probiotics are good bacteria that also help strengthen your immune system and may give some extra protection from microbial infections (ie food poisoning). Good bacteria can help prevent both constipation and diarrhoea on holiday. Probiotics, too, are safe supplements, with no known side effects and no negative drug interactions. However, if you are on any medication it is advisable to first check with your doctor whether you can take them.

#5 Travel With Ginger

Motion Sickness – long journeys in a car, on a bus, a plane or boat are not for everyone. It is not entirely established why some people get motion sickness when others don’t. One possible reason is the discrepancy between the information the motion sensors in our inner ear are sending to the brain and the information coming from the eyes: You may be sitting motionless in a car (and your motion sensors can tell), but your eyes see the scenery hurtling past. Whatever the reason, if you are prone to motion sickness carry some fresh ginger with you and chew it when feeling nauseous. Ginger is a great natural remedy for nausea.

#6 Wash Your Hands Regularly

Air travel – It is common for people to catch a cold or flu when travelling on planes. This is often blamed on ‘recycled air’ spreading germs all over the airplane, but most likely the source of infection is the same as on the ground, and that is the transmission of microbes from surfaces to your skin or face. Your best protection is a strong immune system (see above) and to wash your hands frequently. It may be a good idea to carry anti-bacterial wipes.

#7 Drink Lots of Water

Hopefully you will not experience food poisoning and are taking all the known precautions to avoid it. (see http://www.thetravelmagazine.net/avoid-food- poisoning-abroad.html) If you are affected, go to see a local doctor. Unfortunately, most likely there is not much they can do, other than let it run its course. It is important that you top up your fluids on a regular basis – drink (bottled!) water, not fizzy drinks. Continue to take your probiotic supplement! If you are travelling to a hot country and are not sure about the facilities in your room or holiday home, it may be best to get a supplement that does not require refrigeration, such as Bionutri Ecodophilus, which is freeze-dried and blister-packed.

This article was written by Melanie Ryan, NUTRITIONAL THERAPIST, DIPION MBANT RCNHC

Louise
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