A recent study reveals that a handful of nuts every week can increase one's life span.
Any sort of nuts that even includes the popular legume peanuts, if consumed on a daily basis reduce the chances of death associated with heart disease or cancer.
"The most obvious benefit was a reduction of 29 percent in deaths from heart disease - the major killer of people in America," said Dr. Charles Fuchs of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, the lead author of the study, to medical express."But we also saw a significant reduction - 11 percent - in the risk of dying from cancer."
The study was jointly conducted by researchers from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Brigham and Women's Hospital, and the Harvard School of Public Health. Alongside the life extending qualities, regular consumption of nuts also results in slender bodies, says the research team.
The researchers analyzed two big studies done to determine consumption pattern of nuts among people in the last 30 years. The first study is an ongoing Nurse Health Study that contains data of more than 12,000 people, interviewed since 1976. The second observational study is a follow up of nearly 50,000 health professionals about their nut-eating habits since 1986. The obese and the smokers were not included in the list as they have to abide by strict dietary rules that bar nuts.
People who have nuts seven times or more a week, their mortality chances reduce by 20 percent. "In all these analyses, the more nuts people ate, the less likely they were to die over the 30-year follow-up period," said, Dr. Ying Bao of Brigham and Women's Hospital, reports NBC. "Just eating nuts every once in a while lowered the death rate by 7 percent over 30 years. Eating nuts twice a week lowered the death rate 11 percent, while people who ate nuts five to six times a week had a 15 percent lower death rate."
According to the researchers, participants who ate nuts on a regular basis had other side benefits like reduced chances of cancer and cardio-vascular diseases. "As compared with participants who consumed nuts less frequently, those who consumed nuts more frequently were leaner, less likely to smoke, more likely to exercise, and more likely to use multivitamin supplements," reveals the study.
Earlier studies have revealed the other benefits of nuts like lowering blood sugar, blood pressure and even gall bladder stones but have not highlighted the effect of nut consumption on mortality.
