Nutrition Health Benefits of Cinnamon for Joint Pain

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It thus makes perfect sense to refocus our attention on the kinds of food that can give our bodies what they need in terms of proper nutrition. Certain types of food have come to enjoy newfound popularity because people are now becoming much more aware of what they have to offer – certain spices, for instance, are no longer just there to add flavor, but are now recognized for being able to help recover more quickly from certain maladies, help reduce pain and discomfort, and help prevent other health issues from even rearing their ugly heads.

Nutritional Facts of Cinnamon

More and more people are becoming aware of what these various spices bring to the proverbial table. Consider ginger, for instance, and even turmeric. Both of these are flavorful ingredients, for sure, with turmeric even being the signature yellow curry spice. But both of these sport powerful anti-inflammatory properties, with turmeric even being an excellent contributor in the fight against inflammation brought on by various arthritic maladies.

While turmeric certainly has the spotlight these days, there are, of course, other spices with great health benefits. Cinnamon, for instance, is a spice everyone is familiar with. Sure, it's easy to use in recipes and a great choice thanks to how it adds a signature sweet flavor and rich warming quality to any dish – particularly hot drinks – it's part of. With its atypical scent and flavor, it's endeared itself to kitchens everywhere, but that's not all it's good for by a long shot. It's also long been a medicinal herb in many cultures, thanks to its widely known health benefits. Researchers even posit that cinnamon is at the top of the list of herbs in terms of antioxidant properties, which is really saying something.

Anti-inflammatory Effects of Cinnamon

The distinctive, familiar color and aroma of cinnamon bark are due to the oily properties of the tree it comes from, and so are the health-giving properties of the spice. The Cinnamomum tree bark contains numerous compounds that are now known to promote health, including cinnamate, cinnamic acid, and cinnamaldehyde. The bark that gives us the cinnamon spice we know is one of the ways we can obtain the benefits of these nutrients as well, but the health benefits of cinnamon can also be obtained through cinnamon essential oil, ground cinnamon bark spice powder, and in extract form that isolates cinnamon's flavonoids, antioxidants and phenolic compounds. All of these combine to make cinnamon one of the most potent spices, able to give immunity-boosting, antioxidant, antimicrobial, antidiabetic, and anti-inflammatory benefits.

In fact, one tablespoon of ground cinnamon contains no grams from fat, protein or sugar, but has 4g of fiber, and 19 calories. This tablespoon is 8% calcium, 68% manganese, 3% vitamin K and 4% iron. One full serving (28g) contains a multitude of useful nutrients in good amounts, from minerals like calcium, iron, phosphorous, zinc and copper, to vitamins like riboflavin, niacin, and Vitamins A, C, E and K, to amino acids like glycine, proline, serine, lysine, and tryptophan. In fact, as far as expected daily values, cinnamon provides over twice as much manganese as you ordinarily need on a daily basis, and 28% of the calcium and 13% iron.

How is Cinnamon Good for Your Health?

• As noted above, cinnamon is full of a wide range of antioxidants, up to 41 protective compounds. These are important for fighting the aging process by reducing damage wrought by free radicals. Cinnamon ranks #7 of all foods and spices worldwide in terms of how concentrated the antioxidants are in it, as per the OTAC scale. This is reflected in a study that compared cinnamon favorably in terms of antioxidant content against 25 other spices, including oregano, thyme, garlic and rosemary.
• Cinnamon functions well as an anti-inflammatory too. This goes beyond just the immediately apparent site of irksome inflammation – joint pain – and could even have farther-reaching benefits, such as helping lower the risk of inflammation-based problems like PMS pain, allergic reactions, and muscle soreness – not to mention diseases like cancer, heart disease, and decline in brain function. Cinnamon contains over seven types of flavonoid compounds, which are known to be quite effective at fighting off swelling and inflammation.
• Aside from these, cinnamon has been found to help fight diabetes. Diabetes to occur when the body develops a resistance to the hormone insulin, and thus has poor glycemic control; this combines with problematic management of blood sugar in the bloodstream. Cinnamon helps reduce the levels of glucose in the blood (after, say, a high-sugar meal) by blocking alamines, while also helping improve sensitivity to insulin
• As an antioxidant, cinnamon helps the body fight off cancer by helping guard against cell mutation and cancerous tumor growth. There are studies that confirm that cinnamaldehyde in cinnamon helps inhibit the growth of cancer tumors, while causing cell apoptosis in cancerous cells and while also helping protect DNA from this sort of damage.

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