What is Folic Acid? Folic acid is a water-soluble vitamin, which is an essential nutrient for human growth and reproduction, and is also a necessary supplement for pregnant women during pregnancy. According to statistics, half of the neurological defects in newborns are caused by insufficient folic acid in the mother's pregnancy, and folic acid supplementation can greatly reduce the probability of infant malformations.
Studies have also found that the problem of cerebral infarction in the elderly is also related to the lack of folic acid in the body, so scientists believe that the appropriate supplementation of folic acid in the elderly can help prevent the occurrence of cerebral infarction.
So how to add it specifically is correct? The doctor summarizes 4 points when eating folic acid to help you supplement better.
What is the link between folate deficiency and cerebral infarction?
There are millions of new cerebral infarction patients in the mainland every year, most of whom are elderly, and after the onset of cerebral infarction, many patients will leave lifelong sequelae, causing a huge blow to the family and society, especially the destruction of the patients themselves is the most serious.
It is precisely because the number of cerebral infarction patients is increasing and the sequelae are becoming more and more serious, so people have to study "cerebral infarction", hoping to find an effective way to prevent cerebral infarction and improve cerebral infarction, and folic acid is an indispensable barrier.
The intake of folic acid in our lives is mainly through diet, when the content of folic acid in the diet is absolutely insufficient, it will lead to a decrease in serum folate levels, and then the level of serum homocysteine will rise sharply, and the content of serum homocysteine will increase, which is an important risk factor for arterial and atherosclerosis and cardiovascular disease.
Current studies have shown that when serum homocysteine > 16 μmol/L, patients have a greatly increased risk of developing cardiovascular disease. But for every 25 percent reduction in serum homocysteine, the incidence of coronary heart disease and the incidence of stroke are reduced by 11 percent.
If the patient has both high blood pressure and folic acid deficiency, the probability of stroke is much higher than that of normal people, which is also one of the important reasons for the current clinical high rate of cerebral infarction patients.
However, different races and different countries have different requirements for homocysteine, for example, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention believes that the homocysteine level of Americans at 13 μmol/L is an indicator of folate deficiency; The mainland believes that the serum homocysteine content of residents is greater than 15 μmol/L, which is considered to be folate deficiency.
It can be seen that the reason why the elderly in mainland China are prone to cerebral infarction is that in addition to the large number of underlying chronic diseases, the problem of folate deficiency is not in the minority.
Elderly prevention of cerebral infarction supplement folic acid, how to supplement?
Folic acid is widely present in natural animals and plants, and the human body does not need a lot of folic acid, so through a reasonable diet, most of the folate deficiency problems can be basically solved. The following doctor will summarize four important points about folic acid to help you better understand.
1. Pay attention to the amount of folic acid that the human body needs every day
Folic acid absorption needs to be decomposed and fermented by the digestive tract, and can only be absorbed after converting folic acid into monoglutamate, and because this substance is a water-soluble vitamin, the time spent in the human body is not very long, and we have to continue to obtain it from food.
The dietary guidelines for Chinese residents recommend that the daily supplementation of folic acid content Chinese is about 400 micrograms, and dietary and synthetic supplements can be used.
Among them, the synthetic supplementary method has adopted the process of single glutamate, so it can be directly absorbed by the human body, and some scientists say that if it is natural folic acid, the absorption rate in the human body is about 50%, but the absorption rate of synthetic monoglutamate is nearly 100%.
2. The older you are, the more you may need folic acid supplementation
Scientists say that as people age, folic acid supplementation is necessary. Because the older the age, the content of homocysteine in the human body will continue to rise, and the concentration of homocysteine in the blood of men will be higher than that of women, which will increase the production of free radicals in the body and cause great harm to organs and blood vessels.
3. Pay attention to conditioning the stomach
The reason why some elderly people eat normally, there will also be insufficient folic acid, because after age, gastric acid secretion is seriously lacking, insufficient gastric acid secretion will cause atrophic gastritis, poor digestion ability, and the absorption of folic acid is absolutely insufficient.
Therefore, when the elderly supplement folic acid, they may pay more attention to the "amount" and stomach conditioning, and increase the intake of folic acid to make up for the lack of gastrointestinal digestion capacity caused by the loss of folic acid absorption.
4. When supplementing food, what foods can I eat more?
Natural folic acid food sources are as follows, and you can use them as needed.
Green leafy vegetables, soy products, lean meats, eggs, animal offal, etc., all contain a lot of folic acid. There are also quinoa, dried soybeans, miscellaneous beans, curd bamboo, fennel, amaranth, etc., which are also foods rich in folic acid.
In addition to folic acid, supplementing with these can also prevent cerebral infarction
Folic acid is not the only substance that can prevent cerebral infarction, there are many substances that can also prevent cerebral infarction in the elderly, and doctors will introduce it to you a little.
First, protein supplementation. The elderly gastrointestinal function is problematic, so the absorption capacity of protein is relatively poor, long-term lack of protein, the brain, blood vessels, organs, etc. will have an impact, disguised resulting in cerebral infarction, appropriate supplementation of protein can strengthen the body.
Secondly, vitamins and trace elements. Vitamins A, B, C, D, etc. are all helpful to cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, and trace elements such as zinc, iron, copper, potassium, etc. can also improve the patient's cerebrovascular problems.
Again, eat some fiber-rich foods. Studies believe that the elderly difficulty in defecation may have a lot to do with cerebral infarction attacks, defecation is mainly to excrete toxins from the human body, if the elderly often constipation, it will cause the problem of repeated absorption of stool, harmful substances will enter the blood, may increase the risk of cerebral infarction.
Moreover, long-term constipation can cause the elderly to frequently exert force to stool, which will raise blood pressure and lead to bursting blood vessels. Therefore, eating some vegetables, melons and fruits, and coarse grains rich in dietary fiber can help to defecate.
In addition to folic acid, what are the reasons for the high incidence of cerebral infarction in the elderly?
Folic acid is only one of the factors that lead to cerebral infarction in the elderly, and clinically it is not only the lack of folic acid that can lead to cerebral infarction in the elderly, but also a large number of reasons that cause cerebral infarction in the elderly.
1. Underlying diseases are not controlled. This is one of the common causes of cerebral infarction, such as hyperlipidemia, atherosclerosis, hypertension, diabetes, etc., these diseases can cause the rupture of cerebrovascular epithelial cells, if the blood pressure rises again, it is easy to have the problem of cerebral vascular bursting, which occurs cerebral hemorrhage and stroke, which is more dangerous than the general cerebral infarction.
2. Intense mood swings. If the mood swings of the elderly are too large or too tired, the blood lipid plaques in the blood vessels will fall off, resulting in thrombosis and cerebral infarction. Doctors recommend that the elderly should cultivate their minds and not have too strong emotional fluctuations, which is not conducive to physical health.
3. Accident. Clinically, some patients have cerebral infarction that is not caused by disease factors, but caused by trauma, such as falling down, being knocked down, etc., falling to the ground after being seriously injured, and then having a cerebral infarction, which is not a minority of such patients.
4, do not pay attention. Like the elderly in rural and remote areas, the cognition of cerebral infarction is very shallow, even if the cerebral infarction attack, they do not know what disease they have, let alone go to the hospital for examination.
Sometimes there are precursors to cerebral infarction, such as dizziness, vomiting, headache, hemiplegia, etc., but they may feel that it is a small problem, and patience will pass, and as a result, a big problem will occur.
In summary, the elderly cerebral infarction is a serious problem, we need to invest energy, funds to study the preventive measures in this regard, folic acid supplementation is a reasonable way, but we also have to combine the specific conditions of the elderly, do not blindly supplement.