#HeartHealth

Across Thai kitchens from Chiang Mai’s busy markets to quiet household pantries near Nakhon Si Thammarat, garlic’s sharp aroma is a familiar staple. Beyond flavor, krathiam—Allium sativum L.—carries a long history of healing beliefs and now sits at the crossroads of tradition and scientific inquiry. In Thailand, garlic is both a folk remedy and a subject of global medical research.

In Thai traditional healing, garlic has been used as a carminative to ease digestive upset, reduce bloating, and address wind (lom) in the body. Practitioners view it as a tonic that supports lung and heart function, and its diuretic effects are noted in historic manuscripts. Modern dialogue often frames these uses within a broader wellness approach. Research by Thai scholars and practitioners highlights how crushing or mincing garlic activates enzymes that release beneficial compounds, underscoring a bridge between heritage and laboratory findings.

In Thai kitchens large and small, from spirited street corners in Chiang Mai to family tables on the outskirts of Nakhon Si Thammarat, the hot, sharp aroma of garlic is so familiar as to be invisible. But behind every clove of Allium sativum L.—known across Thailand as krathiam, or by regional names such as hua thiam and hom khaw—is a legacy spanning centuries of healing, belief, and now, modern medical research. Far from being a mere flavouring, garlic sits proudly at the intersection of heritage and laboratory, as both folk remedy and subject of global clinical inquiry.

A new study from a leading U.S. medical school introduces Daily Heart Rate Per Step (DHRPS), a simple metric aimed at helping people understand heart health. By dividing average daily heart rate by daily step count, DHRPS reflects cardiovascular efficiency and potential risk for related conditions. The research was published in a major cardiology journal.

As wearables become commonplace, DHRPS offers an intuitive way to combine two familiar metrics. Instead of looking at steps or heart rate alone, this metric highlights how efficiently the heart works at a given activity level. Researchers analyzed data from thousands of smartwatch users and linked it to medical records, finding that higher DHRPS values correlated with increased risk for conditions such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, heart failure, stroke, coronary artery disease, and heart attack.