Wheatgrass is a variety of grass. The above ground part of this grass, be it the roots or rhizomes are used to make medicine. Wheatgrass is also a rich source of Vitamin A, C, E, Calcium, Magnesium and Amino Acids. Below explained regarding benefits of wheatgrass.
Wheatgrass can be defined as a food which is prepared from cotyledons of wheat plant. This is commonly sold as a juice or powder concentrate. Though it can be grown commonly in homes, it is also available in tablet and frozen benefits wheatgrass juice form.
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Wheatgrass nutritional benefits
Wheatgrass is essentially gluten free as its juice is extracted from wheatgrass sprouts.
History of Wheatgrass
Wheatgrass has been around for long enough. Its history can be traced back to over 5000 years ago. It was available during ancient Egyptian and Mesopotamian times too. However, its consumption in Western nations became popular only after 1930s. This after certain experiments on its worth were conducted by Charles F. Schnabel. The plant was available for sale on commercial basis by 1940s in drug stores across US and Canada.
Cultivation of Wheatgrass
Wheatgrass can be grown, both indoors and outdoors. Sprout production indoors can be done on trays in a growth medium. The leaves of the same can be harvested when another leaf develops from this split. Up to three cuttings can be taken from a single offshoot though the sugar contents decrease with every such split.
Benefits of Wheatgrass
Wheatgrass is a rich source of chemicals that have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties. This makes it extremely beneficial for treating ulcerative colitis. In addition, Wheatgrass also contains chemicals that kill bacterial infections.
Blood disorder known as beta- thalassemia also gets cured if Wheatgrass juice is taken in significant dosage. If wheatgrass juice is taken for 18 months, the need of blood transfusion in children suffering from beta- thalassemia gets reduced to a large extent.
Wheatgrass is also a pain healer. If wheatgrass cream is applied to bottom of feet twice a day for six weeks, heel pain gets reduced significantly. In addition, Wheatgrass is known for its curative properties in patients suffering from anaemia, diabetes, cancer, high blood pressure and other common infections.
Nutritional contents
Wheatgrass is considered to be a good source of potassium. In addition, it has a fair presence of dietary fibres, Vitamin E, Vitamin K, Vitamin B6 and niacin. Iron, Zinc, Copper, Manganese and Selenium is also found in good quantity in Wheatgrass. These are some of the Wheatgrass nutritional benefits.
Health claims related to Wheatgrass
Those who advocate the use of Wheatgrass also make certain claims of its health benefits. These relate from maintenance of the well being to prevention of cancer. American Cancer Society however belies these assumptions and points that it does not have significant proof that Wheatgrass has anti cancer properties or can in any way reduce the incidence of a life threatening condition as cancer.
However some studies carried out in 2002 did show that Wheatgrass has curative effects in ulcerative colitis and does benefit in cases where breast cancer chemotherapy has been done.
Wheatgrass Benefits are many in which few of them are explained above.
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