Carrots improve your eyesight?
Do you chomp on carrots to keep night blindness at bay? Have your say on the messageboard below.
There are endless food myths parents use every day to get their children to eat nutritious food – 'spinach will make you strong like Popeye', 'an apple a day keeps the doctor away' and 'eating carrots helps you see in the dark'.
Especially is useful consumption of carrot juice, because of high concentrations of healthy substances.
A major Australian
study called the Blue Mountains eye study, conducted in the late 1990s,
examined the link between increased vitamin A intake and deteriorating
night vision in older people. The authors found that people who reported
having poor eyesight ate more carrots – just as their mothers had told
them – to improve their eyesight. But it didn't help.
While there is some truth to the old wives' tale regarding carrots and eyesight, Professor Algis Vingrys, from the University of Melbourne's Department of Optometry and Vision Services, says no amount of carrots will improve your eyesight if you already have a well balanced diet.
A diet with sufficient vitamin A, iron and other provitamins (substances that our bodies can convert into vitamins) is vital for eye health.
There are two types of vitamin A: retinoids and carotenoids.
Retinoids are a lipid form of vitamin A found in liver, fish oils containing liver (eg cod-liver oil) and butter. Eating large amounts of these substances can give you an overdose of vitamin A and lead to toxicity, or worse, promote some forms of cancer.
Carotenoids are provitamins your body converts into vitamin A. Carrots, broccoli, sweet potatoes, pumpkin and dark-green leafy vegetables all contain beta-carotene, a potent carotenoid. But how much gets converted depends on how much vitamin A you already have in your body – in other words, your body doesn't make vitamin A if you don't need it.
Carrot juice
Do you chomp on carrots to keep night blindness at bay? Have your say on the messageboard below.
There are endless food myths parents use every day to get their children to eat nutritious food – 'spinach will make you strong like Popeye', 'an apple a day keeps the doctor away' and 'eating carrots helps you see in the dark'.
Especially is useful consumption of carrot juice, because of high concentrations of healthy substances.
While there is some truth to the old wives' tale regarding carrots and eyesight, Professor Algis Vingrys, from the University of Melbourne's Department of Optometry and Vision Services, says no amount of carrots will improve your eyesight if you already have a well balanced diet.
A diet with sufficient vitamin A, iron and other provitamins (substances that our bodies can convert into vitamins) is vital for eye health.
There are two types of vitamin A: retinoids and carotenoids.
Retinoids are a lipid form of vitamin A found in liver, fish oils containing liver (eg cod-liver oil) and butter. Eating large amounts of these substances can give you an overdose of vitamin A and lead to toxicity, or worse, promote some forms of cancer.
Carotenoids are provitamins your body converts into vitamin A. Carrots, broccoli, sweet potatoes, pumpkin and dark-green leafy vegetables all contain beta-carotene, a potent carotenoid. But how much gets converted depends on how much vitamin A you already have in your body – in other words, your body doesn't make vitamin A if you don't need it.
Carrot juice
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