If you want strong, healthy bones, then what you put on your plate really matters. The good news is that you can help improve your bone health with every meal and snack if you include a bone-friendly food. Generally, the best foods for healthy bones are fresh fruits and vegetables and other whole foods, organically grown. Foods that promote your body’s acid/alkaline balance are critical, and this is easy to achieve if you include fruits and veggies. That’s because these foods contain good amounts of nutrients that support that balance, including beta-carotene, fiber, magnesium (RDA, 420 mg), potassium (RDA, 3,500 mg), and vitamin D (RDA, 200 IU).

There’s a lot of emphasis on calcium (RDA, 1,000 mg) for strong bones, but other nutrients are important as well. After all, calcium does not work alone! We’ve already mentioned potassium and magnesium, and we also want to add vitamin K (Adequate Intake, 80 mcg), omega-3 fatty acids (no RDA), and even vitamin B12 (RDA, 2.4 mcg). You will find all of these bone-building nutrients among our ten foods for super bones!

Three other quick recommendations to promote bone health:

• Engage in regular weight-bearing exercise
• Watch your salt (sodium) intake. Sodium increases calcium losses, with 5 to 10 mg of calcium lost with every gram of salt that you consume.
• Skip the soft drinks. Remember, soft drinks = soft bones. Carbonated drinks are high in phosphate, which binds calcium in the intestinal tract and reduces its absorption. Phosphate also forms acid in the blood, and the body then releases calcium from bone into the bloodstream to maintain the calcium-phosphate balance and counteract the acid in the blood.

So, let’s start building healthy bones with ten super foods. Many of these foods can be combined to create extra super bone health treats! Read more »»

We are big believers in vitamin D for joint health at JoMo.  In fact the new JoMo formulation now has 2000IU of vitamin D in every dose (see below for some of the dosage recommendations from Harvard and other organizations).  Here is some of the latest research on vitamin D as it applies to joint health as well as heart disease, prostate cancer, diabetes and colon cancer.

Vitamin D Joint and Bone Health

Vitamin D and calcium work in tandem to improve bone density and reduce the risk of hip and other fractures, and numerous studies have shown this relationship. Vitamin D alone is also essential for promoting calcium absorption and maintaining adequate concentrations of calcium and phosphate to allow normal mineralization of bone. It is also necessary for bone growth and bone repair. Without sufficient intake of vitamin D, bones can become thin, brittle, or misshapen. Sufficient levels of vitamin D prevent rickets in children, osteomalacia in adults, and along with calcium, protects individuals from development of osteoporosis. (National Institutes of Health) Read more »»

We are big believers in Vitamin D at JoMo.  That’s why the next batch of JoMo will now include 2000IU’s in every dose, the highest dose of vitamin in any liquid joint supplement.  While we love vitamin D for its bone health, arthritis support and anti-cancer properties as well as its benefits for rheumatoid arthritis, a new study also shows that during pregnancy, women should take ten times the amount of the current RDA of 400 International Units (IU) of vitamin D. Read more »»