Oranges can be the healthiest snack for the day as this juicy, tangy fruit has in store immense amounts of benefits for your eyes, skin, hair and overall health. Loaded with fibre, necessary proteins, vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and flavonoids, oranges have great health benefits and have an all-round contribution to your diet. Remember to keep this citrus fruit as an essential part of your diet.
Health benefits of oranges
Apart from blessing you with flawless skin, good eyesight and hair growth, oranges have loads of other health benefits such as:-
Healthy way to lose weight
Citrus fruits like oranges are a good way to lose weight fast. Oranges are high in fibre and contain very less carbs or calories. This fills you up without making you fat. Try to have more of oranges in your diet if you are looking forward to lose weight in a healthy way.
Arthritis
Oranges are said to be good for relieving pain associated with arthritis due to the fact that it is an anti-inflammatory food. Rheumatoid arthritis causes inflammation of the joints which lead to pain that can cripple your movement. Oranges help to soothe the joints by acting upon the inflammation.
Diabetes
People with type 1 diabetes have reportedly shown low blood sugar levels when they have high fibre diets. Type 2 diabetes patients too show better insulin levels when on high fibre diet. Oranges are high on dietary fibre which helps to keep your diabetes in control.
Stroke
Oranges can reduce your chances of suffering from a stroke. An orange has such high amounts of vitamins and minerals that it provides 130% of the recommended vitamin C intake for a person per day. American Heart Association has recommended that having citrus fruits like oranges frequently can prevent the risk of suffering an ischemic stroke. It has also been seen that women who consumed more oranges in life had 19% lesser chances of having an ischemic stroke.
Blood pressure
To reduce blood pressure in case of patients with very high blood pressure levels, it is important to have a low sodium diet. However, that is often not enough. Intake of high amounts of potassium is also needed to keep blood pressure in control. Doctors recommend taking high potassium rich fruits like bananas and oranges every day.
Cancer
Oranges are known to prevent many types of cancer. Some studies suggest that giving orange and its juice to babies during the initial years of life prevents the chances of leukaemia later in life. Vitamin C content in oranges also provides great protection against cancer and negates the free radical damage which leads to cancer. Building up strong immunity with high fibre and nutrient rich fruits like oranges can really lower the chances of colorectal cancer.
Good sleep and learning
Studies suggest that oranges contain an important nutrient called choline which improves sleep pattern and prevents problems like weak or disturbed sleep. It also increases muscle movement, coordination as it transmits the nerve impulses in a better way and improves cognitive faculties like memory and learning. Oranges should be provided to students to increase their memory and concentration.
Good for constipation
Oranges are said to be great for relieving constipation. Since oranges do have a lot of dietary fibre, they help to digest food easily by stimulating the digestive juices in the intestine and also regulate bowel movement.
Bone and teeth health
Being rich in Vitamin C and calcium, oranges provide you great bone and teeth health. Having oranges in your youth can give you freedom from weak bones when you start to get old.
Keeps you away from stomach ulcer
Oranges help to prevent the risk of having a stomach ulcer in life. The high content of fibres in oranges reduces the risk of having ulcers.
Good for foetal health
Pregnant women are advised to have oranges daily because they are a good source of folate. Folate is a nutrient that is very important for the healthy development of the foetus. An orange completes 10% of the recommended daily folate intake for pregnant women.
Aphrodisiac
Oranges are mildly aphrodisiac in nature and can be helpful in case of men with sexual problems like lack of sex drive, impotence, frigidity and erectile dysfunction.