Kids Supplements: A Consumer Guide

Two of Organika’s Kids Supplements Have Earned the Parent Tested Parent Approved (PTPA) Seal From one family to another, the entire Organika Kids line was created to help parents provide essential nutrients to their littles in easy, child-friendly, no-fuss formats. Formulations are carefully created, third-party tested and now being recognized by parent groups as some of the best kids supplements on the market. PTPA Seal on Baby Probiotic Drops with Vitamin D and Li'l Kids Multi Vitamin Spray Made for kids, recommended by parents. The PTPA seal has been earned for our Li'l Kids Multi Vitamin Spray and Baby Probiotic Drops with Vitamin D. Both of these products were one of the first to be introduced as part of the kids supplements at Organika. The Li'l Kids Multi Vitamin Spray is targeted for kids aged 1-3. It provides essential vitamins for your toddler’s growing needs in an easy spray format. It’s great to support growth and development, provide immune support, eye health, and more. Baby Probiotic Drops With Vitamin D comes with a dropper, so it can be easily provided to breast-fed infants to help maintain a healthy gut flora, support healthy bone and teeth development, and reduce colic. Both supplements are key for the baby to toddler stage, a time where parents are forever concerned about their child's development. To have a seal of approval from other parents confirms we are helping our community and the children within it! What is PTPA exactly? Parent Tested Parent Approved (PTPA) is a community of parents sharing valuable feedback about products, awarding those they recommend through consumer testing and reviews. The PTPA Seal of Approval Award is a consumer-voted awards program focusing on everyday consumer goods products with families in mind. The seal certifies that the products have been evaluated and tested by several parents who feel strong enough about the product to recommend it as something to be used. It is a high standard, as it should be, as far as our little ones are concerned. From baby to adult, it’s a good feeling to be able to take care of the entire family’s needs. Shop Kids Collection Making living healthy achievable for everyone in your life – at all life stages.

Support learning, thinking and playing with these 5 tips to choosing the right food for kids Feeding kids healthy foods isn’t always easy. New parents often have grand ideas of what they want their children to eat. But when it comes to finding healthy foods for kids that they’ll actually eat, it can be a completely different story. Parents with pre-teens and teens on the other hand, can be so busy they’re often eating on the run or even missing meals. Nutrition can be very complex, but the good news is it doesn’t have to be. Keeping things simple and focusing on the fundamentals will go a long way to supporting your child’s capacity to learn and perform at school and play. Unfortunately, processed foods and sugary drinks surround our kids at school and in TV ads, promoting the rising tide of childhood weight gain and poor health. Obesity rates in children have tripled over the past 30 years and today over 30% of kids are either overweight or obese. The situation is even worse in adults at a whopping 70%! This coincides with a dramatic increase in sugar intake, as well as an alarming rise in prescriptions for depression and attention deficit disorder in children. Almost every high school cafeteria across the country serves pizza, fries and soda pop. Unfortunately, the food choices that are most easily available (and the cheapest) are processed foods – cereals, burgers, fries, sodas, sport drinks, candy, etc. - that are calorically very-dense, but nutrient poor. To support a healthy body and mind, we need to get our kids back on nutrient-dense whole foods. 5 Tips for Choosing the Right Food for Kids The following are my top 5 tips to help provide your kids with the vitamins, minerals and nutrients they need to think, learn and thrive at school and play. 1. Protein at Every Meal (Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner) Protein is an essential nutrient, meaning your body cannot make the amino acid building blocks internally and must get them from the diet. Protein helps build red blood cells for energy, immune cells to fight off colds and flu, muscle for overall health and has been shown to support positive mood and reduce behaviour problems. Great options for breakfast include eggs, full-fat plain yogurt, steel-cut oats, nuts and seeds or a protein smoothie. Kids should aim for 20g of protein per meal or about 1-2x the size and thickness of the palm of their hand. Our Enhanced Collagen is great to sneak into your pudding, pasta sauce, as its virtually tasteless and has a high protein content. 2. Increase Healthy Fats Fats are essential for your child’s capacity to learn and thrive at school. If you grew up in the low-fat era of the 1980-90s, it can be difficult to shift gears, but the research here is very clear. Ensuring your child gets their dose of “smart fats” like egg yolks, full-fat dairy (i.e. milk or yogurt), butter or avocado at every meal helps to build a healthy brain and improve learning. Try adding healthy saturated fats like coconut oil into smoothies or cook with extra virgin olive oil to get your kids their daily dose. At least 1-2 “thumb” sizes of fats per meal and don’t worry if you overshoot, kids typically thrive on high “smart” fat diets. 3. Choose Whole Food Carbohydrates Kids need calories to meet the demands of busy days and constant play. The fats mentioned above provide a great source of calories as well as “whole food” carbohydrates like rice, sweet or white potatoes, root vegetables (i.e. beets, carrots, parsnips, etc), oats and whole-grain breads and pastas. If your child has a sensitivity to gluten, modify to gluten-free carbs.) Whole food carbs are also full of fiber to support healthy gut bacteria and keep your child regular. Typically 1-2 “cupped hands” per meal is a good place to start for kids and can be higher depending on their activity level. Do your best to limit processed carbs that come in packages and boxes. 4. Limit Sugar Sugar is not inherently evil, however the levels of sugar added into our food today is quite staggering. The average adult consumes about 160 lb. of sugar per year, (compared to only 40 lb. two generations ago) and kids are following very closely in our foot steps. Sugar is highly palatable, which means our brains naturally crave it and we can eat more and more before we get full. Making things even more challenging, food companies market directly to kids to make their products even more desirable. Limit the amount of added sugar in your child’s diet by cutting back (or cutting out) soda pop, sports drinks, candy, chocolate bars, sugary cereals and sweetened snacks. Try alternatives like replacing regular chocolate bars with dark chocolate (70% or more), choose ice cream made with natural cream (higher in fat), snack on frozen berries or use frozen fruit to make popsicles at home. 5. Limit Processed Foods (i.e. vegetable oils, artificial sweeteners, etc.) It’s not just sugar that is strongly contributing to our nations declining health, it’s also all the processed foods, industrial seed oils, chemical sweeteners and artificial flavourings. You can limit processed foods in your kids diet by shopping on the “outside” of the grocery store, where all the whole foods, fresh veggies and fruit, meat and dairy are located. If you can minimize the middle aisles of the grocery store (i.e. processed foods), you’ll decrease your intake of unhealthy processed foods that contribute to impaired learning, poor behavior and adverse health conditions in children. Kids need the right balance of nutrients to thrive at school and play. Ensuring kids get enough protein, healthy fats and whole food carbs, along with limiting sugars and processed oils, sweeteners and GMOs is a fantastic foundation for health. To make things even simpler, follow this golden rule; if your grandparent could eat it, it’s probably a good choice (if not, do your best to avoid it!). Once you find the right balance, make the time to eat with your kids at least once a day, to make mealtime more than just the food on your plate. Dr. Marc Bubbs ND, CISSN, CSCS Dr. Marc Bubbs ND, CISSN, CSCS Dr. Marc Bubbs is a board certified Naturopathic Doctor, Sports Nutrition Lead for the Canadian Men's Basketball Team, and author of The Paleo Project. Find him on social media @drbubbs

by Dr. Cheryl Cooper, ND Getting back into the routine of school can be tough on kids and parents alike. Setting everyone up for an easy transition makes going back to school a fun and exciting time of year. Below are some tips and tricks to make it easier for everyone. Sleep is essential It’s surprising to know how much sleep kids need to function optimally. Sleep allows kids’ bodies and minds to grow and thrive and when they aren't getting enough, it affects them in ways that are detrimental to their health on so many levels. According to the National Sleep Foundation school age, kids need an average of 8-12 hours of sleep every night to be healthy1. (See chart below) Not sleeping well or enough can impact kids energy, their ability to think and remember, and their emotional well-being. If your child isn’t sleeping well for any reason, this needs to be addressed early as it is likely to become a chronic problem that affects them for the rest of their lives. One of the most important aspects of sleep for kids (and adults) is routine. Getting to bed at a regular time every night helps their body to know that it’s time to wind down and go to sleep. Having bedtime rituals also really helps with the preparation for sleep. Having a bath, brushing teeth, putting on pyjamas are all good ways for kids to start winding down their day. I also recommend getting them to put away their "screens" an hour before bed. As the electromagnetic field is disruptive to the hormones, the body produces for relaxation and sleep2. While every child is slightly different regarding how much sleep they need, most require the following to be fully rested: Immune Support One of the constant complaints that I deal with in the fall is kids getting sick when they head back to school. In addition to them being inside more, they also are exposed to more infectious germs that, unless their immune systems are healthy, will result in them getting sick. Once they are sick, their immune systems then become compromised setting them up for getting sick more often throughout the school year. One of the most important supplements to give kids before they start back to school is probiotics. A review of research on probiotics specific to immune health concludes that they have an immunomodulatory effect in the body meaning that they can have a direct effect on several immune response-related diseases including allergies, eczema, viral infections and potentiating the vaccination response3. Another way to provide excellent immune system support for kids is to give them medicinal mushrooms. Medicinal mushrooms like Reishi, Cordyceps, Lion's Mane and Shiitake have been used for millennia in Chinese Medicine to support the immune system and prevent illness. When given in proper doses, they can make all the difference for kids to stay healthy throughout the year. A bonus is that there is more research showing that they are also good for brain function and nervous system development4. They can be given to kids in a smoothie or mixed into yogurt or applesauce to make it easy for them to take. They don't even need to know that they’re there! Brain Power The list of health benefits from Omega-3 fatty acids is long5 but, most importantly Omega-3 fatty acids are essential to the brain, and neurological development and most kids (and adults) aren’t getting enough. There are both animal and plant-based omega three fatty acids, and both have been shown to be beneficial for health. Some of the principal sources of omega-3 fatty acids include cold water fatty fish (salmon, mackerel, anchovies, herring), walnuts, ground flax seeds and flax oil. Additionally, grass-fed meats, soy, cruciferous vegetables (kale, broccoli, Brussel sprouts), spinach, watercress and herbs such as parsley and mint all include necessary vitamins, minerals, fibre as well as protein. Diet What kids eat has a direct impact on their ability to function. If kids are eating foods that are nutrient dense and healthy, they will have lots of energy and brain power to get through the demands of their day with ease. Alternately, if they are eating foods with poor nutrient density (sugar, fat and processed foods), they'll struggle to get through their days. An unhealthy diet, of course, will add to any other stress they may already have going on at school. One of the best ways to pack some super nutrients for their energy, brain and immune system function into your kids is to start them out with a smoothie in the morning. Here is one of my kids favourite smoothie recipes: Per person: 1/2 Frozen Banana (I peel the bananas before I freeze them) 1/2 tbsp. Organika's Vege-Pro 2 Pitted Dates One tablespoon of Nut Butter (Almond Butter or Peanut Butter or any other nut butter) One teaspoon of Greens Powder or ½ cup of Greens One teaspoon of Omega 3 Oil (Fish or Flax) One teaspoon Liquid Multivitamin Get your kids off to a great start this year by using these simple tips for ensuring that they have everything they need to be smart, healthy and happy! References 1 https://sleepfoundation.org/excessivesleepiness/content/how-much-sleep-do-babies-and-kids-need 2 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4130204/ 3 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4006993/pdf/nihms-441845.pdf 4 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24716157 5 http://www.healthline.com/nutrition/17-health-benefits-of-omega-3#section7 Dr. Cheryl Cooper B.Sc., ND Dr. Cheryl Cooper is a Naturopathic Doctor and the owner and CEO of Vitallife Integrative Medicine based in Ottawa. She has 20 years of experience in the health and wellness industry, specializing in hormone balancing, women’s health, detoxification, stress management and sleep issues. Dr. Cooper uses a holistic approach to helping patients, involving educating and empowering patients to take control of their health. Recently moved to her hometown of Canmore, Alberta, she now practices out of Inner Balance Spa in Calgary. Vitallife Integrative Medicine @doc_cheryl