Lutein is often hailed as a possible way to protect eyes from macular degeneration, a leading cause of blindness. Researchers at Harvard found eating 6mg of lutein a day (roughly 1/4 cup cooked spinach) lowered the odds of macular degeneration by 43%. According to several other studies, loading up on lutein also seems to reduce the odds of cataracts by 20% to 50%.
Lutein is easy to add to your diet if you eat plenty of spinach and other green, leafy vegetables. These foods provide high levels of lutein every time you eat a spinach salad or a serving of kale or turnip greens. The problem is a lot of people don't like these foods or don't eat enough of them.
Do you get enough lutein in your diet every day? If not, you may want to consider our OccuPlex product. Each soft gel contains 7.5mg of Lutein. And at a cost around $1.50 per week that’s pretty cheap “eye-insurance”. See below for ordering info. But you might want to read on because, lutein does even more.
Lutein protects skin against sun damage
Harvard research indicating that consumption of the antioxidant lutein protects the skin against some of the damaging effects of the sun was presented May 15-18 2002, at the Society for Investigative Dermatology (SID) conference in Los Angeles, Calif.
“Lutein has been widely recognized for its eye health benefits for several years. But, our data is the first of its kind to suggest that lutein may have the potential to act as a preventative agent against UVB-induced skin cancer,” said Salvador Gonzalez, M.D., Ph.D., leader of the research team. “In addition, these data suggest that lutein protects the skin against UVB-induced photo-damage, further validating our position that lutein is a critical component to overall skin health.” But lutein may do even more.
Lutein may even help your Heart.
Why? Because, lutein is found in HDL, or 'good' cholesterol and researchers think it may prevent LDL cholesterol from oxidizing. Evidence from a 1994 study in Circulation suggested that one of the reasons the French have a low risk of heart disease is that they consume foods high in lutein content like spinach and collard greens.
A final note on maintaining healthy eyes:
Preventative measures are important because eye diseases develop over a long period of time. By the time patients are diagnosed with AMD, (Age-related macular degeneration), in their 60's or 70's, the disease may have been developing for 20 years or more. Adding Lutein to your diet now can play an important role in maintaining your healthy eyes.