Many people love to eat grapefruit, and its nutritional value is also very high. However, there are some taboos associated with eating grapefruit, and some special groups should not eat it!
The benefits of eating grapefruit
1. Stomach health: Traditional Chinese medicine believes that grapefruit is sweet and sour in taste, and cold in nature. It has excellent effects on strengthening the stomach, aiding digestion, resolving phlegm, relieving asthma, and sobering up. Modern medical research has found that the extraordinary effects of grapefruit are mainly due to the substances it contains, such as protein, fat, carbohydrates, crude fiber, and rich vitamins C, B2, P, and carotene.
2. Preventing thrombosis: Grapefruit contains extremely rich trace elements such as calcium, potassium, phosphorus, and iron. Therefore, it also has the effects of lowering cholesterol, losing weight, and beautifying the skin. More importantly, these trace elements in grapefruit can also reduce blood viscosity and prevent thrombus formation.
3. Treating diabetes: The potassium element in grapefruit is an ideal dietary fruit for patients with cerebrovascular and kidney diseases. Especially, the insulin-like components in grapefruit make it an ideal food for diabetic patients. While preventing diabetes, it can also help diabetic patients delay complications.
4. Beauty and skin care: The vitamin P in grapefruit can strengthen the function of skin capillaries and help damaged skin tissue recover as soon as possible. Eating grapefruit regularly can make your skin achieve a pore-free state. Moreover, grapefruit contains very low calories, so it has a weight-loss effect, which is in line with the principle of "natural beauty" for women, making it the most suitable fruit for women in autumn.
Eating grapefruit before meals can help with weight loss and blood sugar reduction
Recently, researchers from the Scripps Research Institute in the United States found that eating grapefruit before meals not only has the effect of reducing weight but can also lower insulin levels.
The researchers selected 91 overweight male and female participants and monitored their metabolism and weight for 12 weeks. The participants were divided into four groups. Before each meal, they either took grapefruit extract capsules and apple juice, placebo capsules and apple juice, placebo capsules and grapefruit juice, or placebo capsules and half a fresh grapefruit; three times a day. The experimental results showed that the group who ate grapefruit lost 1.6 kg of weight, the group who drank grapefruit juice lost 1.5 kg, the group who took the grapefruit extract lost 1.1 kg, and the group who took the placebo only lost 0.2 kg. In addition, the participants who ate grapefruit also had lower post-meal insulin levels. This research indicates that eating half a fresh grapefruit before meals helps lower insulin levels related to diabetes.
Grapefruit should not be taken with certain medications
1) Clinical findings have shown that when a hyperlipidemia patient takes a Mevacor tablet with a glass of grapefruit juice, the effect is equivalent to taking 12-15 tablets of the same type of cholesterol-lowering drug with a glass of water, which can cause muscle pain and even kidney damage in the patient.
2) Some patients, while taking the antihistamine terfenadine, experience dizziness, palpitations, arrhythmias, and other symptoms if they eat grapefruit or drink grapefruit juice. In severe cases, it may lead to sudden death.
3) Other drugs that have adverse interactions with grapefruit include cyclosporine, caffeine, calcium channel blockers, and cisapride. The possibility of an interaction with drugs after drinking a glass of grapefruit juice can last for 24 hours.
Therefore, patients who are taking medication, especially the elderly, should best avoid eating grapefruit or drinking grapefruit juice.
Women taking birth control pills should avoid grapefruit
A study in the United States shows that grapefruit has the most significant impact on birth control pills.
Experts say, "If a woman taking birth control pills eats 1-2 grapefruits after sexual intercourse, or directly takes the pill with a large glass of grapefruit juice, she could become a mother. The reason is that grapefruit hinders the absorption of the contraceptive pill by women."