What Do Those Food Cravings Really Mean and Where Can You Validate Some of the Answers?

Is there any place in Sacramento that consumers can go to to find answers and validation as to whether any given food cravings signal a corresponding nutrient deficiency? You could take a look at the article from a 1992 UC Davis Medical School study, Serotonin response in sweet-food craving Alzheimer's disease subjects. And do food cravings just mean your blood sugar/glucose levels are too low?

Are not enough blood and oxygen getting to your brain? Or are there specific nutritional deficiencies depending upon what you crave? Take at look at the uTube videos with Dr. Amen (author of Change Your Brain, Change Your Body). See the uTube videos: 6 Tips to Control Your Food Cravings and Controlling Your Food Cravings Pt 2.

The question you may have is where do you find validated medical information such as published studies on the meaning of cravings or specific food-craving tips? Abnormal sweet-food craving may occur in subjects with Alzheimer's disease, according to the study's abstract. This behavior may be due to abnormalities in the brain serotonin system. Fenfluramine stimulates the brain serotonin neurosystem, producing an increase in systemic prolactin.

If you don't have any disease, could fluctuations in your serotonin levels influence your food cravings at any age? In the UC Davis study, using the fenfluramine stimulation test, brain serotonin system response was evaluated in 12 subjects with probable Alzheimer's disease.

The subjects' caregivers completed questionnaires concerning subject food preferences and behaviors. Alzheimer's disease subjects with sweet-food craving were found to have a significantly higher response to fenfluramine than non sweet-food craving subjects. How does your brain respond to sweet-food cravings? Is there something chemically changed in your body or brain before you start craving a particular food? Perhaps it may be a hormone in your body? Or are you deficient in some nutrient?

The UC Davis study on sweet cravings with Alzheimer's patients was a preliminary study limited by a small sample size. Allowing for assumptions concerning central nervous system regulatory processes, the data suggested a possible role for the serotonin system in sweet-food craving in Alzheimer's disease. The study appears in PMID: 1504133 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]. What about fluctuations in your own serotonin levels perhaps leading to food cravings? Or could the cravings come from some food ingredient or nutrient you're missing? What do other articles say, and where can you validate the evidence?

On the subject of food cravings, according to the article, "Combat Your Food Cravings," in the June 2009 issue of Natural Solutions magazine, page 79, the article notes, if you crave sweets, what your body really needs are trace amounts of chromium, carbon, phosphorus, sulfur, and tryptophan. You can get all of these in small amounts from the following foods: To get enough chromium, eat broccoli, grapes, cheese, dried beans, and chicken. Think about this.

How can you find out whether this idea has been validated in credible medical journals? Where can you turn to for nutrition information after reading interviews in magazines? The only problem with articles where health professionals are intereviewed is where can you go to validate all these statements in scientific studies or journals if references aren't listed in a sidebar?

Where can you find the resources without having to subscribe to the medical journals? Start with the public library or some of the online nutrition sites that have references. You might find the following article links helpful in finding out why you may have food cravings. Do food cravings mean vitamin or mineral deficiencies? See the site, Cravings & Vitamin Deficiencies | Livestrong.com. Also check out the article, Food Cravings and What they Mean. And check out the article, Naturopathyworks - food cravings.

See the article, "What Do Your Food Cravings Mean." The question Sacramento consumers want to ask is whether your body craves a certain food because it needs a specific nutrient found in that food. There's also the phenomenon of false cravings. Where can you check out the following information and validate it? The list appears at the article site, "What Do Your Food Cravings Mean."

Craving chocolate means you're deficient in copper and magnesium. True or False? Where can you validate this information with actual medical studies or medical journal reports? If you crave dairy products, you're deficient in calcium. If you crave nuts and seeds, your deficient in fatty acids, especially omega 3 fatty acids.

You also may be deficient in sea salt. If you crave chocolate when you get PMS, you're deficient in magnesium. During menstruation the need for magnesium increases. If you crave carbs, perhaps your blood glucose is down. Will vitamin B complex in small amounts or a small of magnesium then help? Can your health care team answer that question?

You can figure out that carbs do have some B vitamins, but much of it is stripped out, for example, if you eat white rice. If you crave salt, perhaps you need a bit of iodine in a tiny amount. You won't get it from table salt or salty nuts or chips. Even iodized salt is processed, perhaps, with aluminum. Try toasted nori seaweed instead, unless you're allergic to it.

If you crave sweet and sour foods, is your liver trying to get rid of toxins? What if you crave dill pickle juice, whether you're pregnant or not? Do you need some type of liver support or do you need dark green veggies such as spinach or kale? Is your liver congested? Is your thyroid thermostate turned off? These facts are mentioned in the article, "What Do Your Food Cravings Mean." But if you ask your doctor these questions, what kind of answer do you think you might get? Is your doctor too busy to read medical journals? If so, find them yourself.

How do you locate the studies in which journals? And can you afford to read the abstracts for free or buy a subscription to the journal? Most people can't afford a subscription to to get an answer. Where can you turn for free information to answer these questions with validated medical informational materials?

If you crave sweets, should you eat the whole fruit and avoid the sugary juice to avoid blood glucose spikes that may create insulin sensitivity? What's wrong with the people who crave and eat dirt or chalk? Are they deficient in trace minerals? Do they need a tablespoon of liquid multi-minerals? If you're craving fatty, fried foods, perhaps you need extra virgin olive oil, about a tablespoon, or a cup of coconut milk. Those are questions you need to find answers to, and the problem is the lack of validated information online.

People craving spice may have a thyroid imbalance. Find out. Instead of spice, would garlic give your food the heat you crave? Or are your tastebuds only tasting food as bland? If you need caffeine, are your adrenal glands exhausted? Do you need more vitamin C?

If you smoke, is your craving for a cigarette caused by not enough vitamin B complex in your diet? Or is it caused by emotional stress? If you crave alcohol such as wine or beer, do you have an L-Glutamine deficiency? Or perhaps you have the gene for alcoholism in your family that you've inherited and need to stay away from all alcohol?

Are you addicted to meat or crave meat? What amino acid are you lacking? Is it a problem with protein? Is there excess protein in your diet or none? If you chew on ice, do you have an iron deficiency? Or if you crave beets or beet juice, you may also have an iron deficiency. Get tested and find out. Either you're deficient or your stressed out with nervous exhaustion or adrenal exhaustion. Maybe you need more hours of sleep.

Try taking a small amount of magnesium, one capsule if your doctor okays it and your kidneys are normal and can handle a little magnesium. It may help you not to crave carbs such as ice cream after a hard day's labor. The big problem with all these solutions to cravings is that it's difficult to find validated medical studies online to back up the claims of what causes cravings other than getting your cells or blood tested for deficiencies. Talk to your health care team. It could be you need a test that doesn't measure the serum blood level, but how much of a nutrient actually gets absorbed into your cells.