Olive Leaf Extract

I promised a friend that I'll make ummi darwisya brain food for her. So today, I went to Vitacare to buy Olive Leaf Extract. In the first recipe, I substituted olive leaf extract with virgin olive oil. But tadi, while having lunch kat Chili's KLCC with my sister, Mas, she told me about the benefits of olive leaf extract. According to her, the reason kena H1N1, selsema babi dan macam2 penyakit yang flu related jarang didengar di Israel ialah kerana, dia orang bagi anak2 dia org makan extrak daun zaitun ni together with almond.

Aku pun apa lagi, terus bersemangat untuk buat a new batch of ummi darwisya's brain food untuk anak2 and my dear friend tu. I send her a message dalam fb, cerita pasal benefit brain food tu. She said, at where she lives, it's difficult to find fish oil and habatus sauda. Maybe ada fish oil, but masalah bahasa is the main setback when conversing with the locals. So aku buatkan untuk anak2 my friend tu.

Masa aku call Farik, hubby Zana, asking for the price of the olive leaf extract tu, I thought I heard it wrong when he said it's selling at RM160 per bottle. Bila dia cakap lagi sekali price, I was taken a back! Waaa.. mahal giler! Just for 500ml, harga dah RM160. Kopak duit gue... huhuhu... Nasib baik la bukan guna banyak sangat. Suprisingly, aku suka rasa olive leaf extract tu, sedap sangat2. hehehe.. semua yang aku suka akan fall in the sedap sangat2 category. And, yang bestnya, the brain food tu taste better than the 1st one.

Article below aku ambik from http://www.litnaolive.com/index.php/litna-hs-olive-leaf-extract

What are the healthy benefits?

1. Helps to maintain a normal healthy cardiovascular system
2. Improves blood circulation
3. Hypertension
4. Olive Leaf Extract and Hypoglycemia / Diabetes
5. Immune booster
6. Relieves cough, cold and fever
7. 100% Natural antioxidant and has free radical scavenging properties

Helps to maintain a normal healthy cardiovascular system
Oleuoropein displayed activities to maintain cardiovascular health – enchancing effects. These same studies showed that it was active against barium chloride- induced arrhythmia and against calcium- induced arrhythmia, as well as inducing a long-lasting effects of lowering elevated blood pressure . Of course, these studies, like all others, indicated that olive leaf extract and its individual constituents were extremely safe and non-toxic.

Improves blood circulation

Coronary Dilating Action of Olive Leaf Extract.
Since 1977, when trial began in Bulgaria, olive leaf extract (and specifically its constituent oleuropein) has been the source of great interest concerning coronary dilation(the expanding/ contracting ability of the arteries). Compared against other plant substances, oleuoropein displayed a clear ability to promote healthy dilatatory action in coronary arteries. In fact, the results of these studies were extremely impressive. When oleuoropein was administered , the coronary artery blood flow in the laboratory animal increased by more than 50 percent, indeed a significant increase.

Hypertension

Another area of extreme interest concerning olive leaf extract has been that of lowering high blood pressure. As stated earlier, the University of Granada conducted experiments showing that oleuropein , another component present in the extract of the olive leaf , may be responsible for the vasodilator on the smooth muscle layer of coronary arteries. Say the researches:

We studied the importance of the smooth vascular muscle endothelium in the vasodilator action of the decoction of olive (olive europaea) leaf. We also showed that oleuropeoside is a component responsible for vasodilator activity but, from the results, it seem likely that at least one other principle is to be found in the olive leaf which is either a vasodilator itself or else potentiates the relaxant effect of oleuropein.
(Zarzuelo, et al,. 417)

In other words, it appears that oleuropeoside can reduce high blood pressure levels by causing constricted arteries to relax and become more flexible, thereby allowing for more blood flow. They also note that there is probably at least one other component that aids oleuropeoside in this relaxation process.

Earlier studies comfirm the findings of the University of Granada In Bulgaria, it was first hypothesized that oleuropein also can have a beneficial effect on elevated blood pressure. In fact, studies at the Department of Exprimental and Clinical Pharmacology of the Postgrduate Medical Institute showed that it could reduce high blood pressure levels by an average of 68 percent of the initial level in some animals, and as high as 36 percent in other animal.

Olive Leaf Extract and Hypoglycemia / Diabetes

Researchers at the University of Granada in Spain found that extract from the olive leaf could have significant effect on the management of blood sugar levels. The compound, oleuropeoside is responsible for the hypoglycemic activity and may result from two mechanisms: (a) potention of glucose-induced insulin release and (b) increased peripheral uptake of glucose (Gonzalez,etal.,513). In other words, the researchers hypothesize that oleuropein could actually stimulate the production of insulin (which plays a key role in the utilization of blood sugar) or in the enhancement of utilization of blood sugar in the extremities.

Immune booster

There are numerous symptoms and conditions that are a result of viral, bacterial and fungal infection. Herpes, AIDS and other auto immune disorders all have direct connections to problems associated with the immune system and its inability to function correctly. Olive leaf extract can help in fighting any type of infection that may be present. Olive leaf extract is suitable for children and adult.

Relieves cough, cold and fever

Oleuropein contains elenolic acid when consumed works with the body system to eradicate multiple pathogens, viruses, yeast and host of dangerous bacterias. There is ample data that gives a fairly accurate of how olive leaf extract provides various therapeutic benefits. Dr, James R.Pritivera , M.D., explains these processes.

* Olive leaf extract provides interference with viral infection and/or spreading by inactivating specific virus cells or by inhibiting their shedding, budding, and assembly at the cell membrane.
* Olive leaf extract also interferes with certain amino acid production essential for the survival of specific microbes, be it virus, bacterium, parasite, or fungus.
* Compounds of olive leaf extract can directly penetrate infected human cells and inhibits further microbial reproduction.
* Olive leaf extract also may stimulate directly the formation of immune system cells that combat various types of microbes.

100% Natural antioxidant and has free radical scavenging properties

Researchers and scientist are familiar with olive leaf extract and recognizes oleuropein as its major active ingredient responsible for a variety of health benefits in human. A study by Visioli and team targeted oleuropein ability to act as a free radical scavenger. This study was successful in demonstrating oleuropein’s antioxidant effects.