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The Best Diet for Crohn’s Disease Treatment
"The Best Diet for Crohn's
Disease Treatment" Important to our understanding
and prevention of the global increase in inflammatory bowel disease, we know
that dietary fiber appears to reduce risk, whereas dietary fat, animal protein,
and sugar may increase risk. "Despite the recognition of the
westernization of lifestyle as a major driver of the growing incidence
of inflammatory bowel disease, no countermeasures against such lifestyle
changes have been recommended, except that patients with Crohn's
disease shouldn't smoke." Look, we know consuming
whole, plant-based foods is synonymous with an
anti-inflammatory diet. Here's a list of foods
with inflammatory effects; here's a list of foods with
anti-inflammatory effects. So how about putting a
plant-based diet to the test? Just cutting down on red and
processed meat didn't work, but what about cutting
down on all meat? A 25-year-old guy diagnosed
with Crohn's disease, but failed to enter clinical remission
despite standard medical therapy.
But after switching to a diet based
exclusively on grains, legumes— like beans, split peas, chickpeas,
and lentils—vegetables, and fruits, he entered clinical remission,
without the need for medication and showed no signs of Crohn's
disease on follow-up colonoscopy. It's worth delving into
some of the details. The conventional treatment they started
him on is infliximab, sold as REMICADE, which can cause a stroke, and may
increase your chances of getting lymphoma and other cancers—but
it's a bargain for only $35,000 a year. And it may not even work
in 35 to 40% of patients, and that seemed to be the case
here, so they upped the dose after 37 weeks, and still suffering
after two years on the drug— until he tried completely eliminating
animal products and processed foods from his diet—finally experiencing
a complete resolution of his symptoms. Prior to this, his diet had
been a typical American diet. But having experienced complete
clinical remission for the first time since his diagnosis, he decided
to switch to a whole-food, plant-based diet permanently, severely
reducing his intake of processed food and limiting animal products
to one serving, or less, per week.
And whenever his diet started to slip,
symptoms started coming back. But he could always wipe
them out by eating healthier. After six months of implementing
these changes in diet and lifestyle, including stress relief and exercise,
a follow-up demonstrated complete mucosal healing of the gut lining with
no visible evidence of Crohn's disease. We know a diet consisting of whole
grains, legumes, fruits, and vegetables has been shown to be helpful in the
prevention and treatment of heart disease, obesity, diabetes,
hypertension, gallbladder disease, rheumatoid arthritis,
and many cancers. Although further research is required,
this case report suggests that Crohn's disease might be
added to this list of conditions. But that further research
has already been done! About 20 patients with Crohn's disease
were placed on a semi-vegetarian diet, meaning no more than a half-
serving of fish once a week and a half-serving of meat
once every two weeks, and achieved 100% remission rate
at one year, and 90% at two years. Some strayed from the diet though.
Let's see what happened to them.
After a year, half had relapsed, and at
year two only 20% remained in remission. But those that stuck with
it had remarkable success. It was a small study with
no formal control group, but represents the best reported
result in Crohn's relapse prevention published in the medical
literature to date. Nowadays, Crohn's patients are often
treated with so-called biologic drugs, expensive injected antibodies that
suppress your immune system and have effectively induced
and maintained remission in Crohn's disease,
but not in everyone. The current remission rate in Crohn's
with early use of REMICADE: 64%. So 30 to 40% of patients are likely to
experience a disabling disease course even after treatment.
So what
about adding a plant-based diet? Remission rates jumped up to 100%
for those who didn't have to drop out due to drug side effects. Even
if you exclude the milder cases, 100% of those with serious, even severe
fulminant disease achieved remission. But if you look at gold standard
systematic reviews, they conclude that the effects of dietary interventions
on inflammatory bowel diseases, Crohn's disease and ulcerative
colitis, are uncertain. This is because only randomized
controlled trials were considered. Totally understandable, as that's
the most rigorous study design. Nevertheless, people with inflammatory
bowel disease deserve advice based on the 'best available evidence'
rather than no advice at all. And switching to a plant-based diet
has been shown to achieve far better outcomes than those
reported on conventional treatments in both active and quiescent stages
in both Crohn's and ulcerative colitis. For example, here's one-year
remission rates in Crohn's disease: 100% compared to budesonide, an
immunosuppressant corticosteroid drug; a half elemental diet, meaning
like at-home tube feedings; the $35,000 a year drug REMICADE;
or the $75,000 a year drug Humira. Safer, cheaper, and more effective? Maybe we should recommend plant-based
diets for inflammatory bowel disease.
It would seem clear that treatment
based on treating the cause of the disease is optimal. Spreading the word about healthier
diets could help halt the scourge of inflammatory bowel, but how
are people going to hear about this amazing research without some
kind of public education campaign? That's what NutritionFacts.org
is all about..
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
Prunes vs. Metamucil vs. Vegan Diet
“Prunes vs. Metamucil vs. Vegan Diet” Though there is an
International Prune Association, keeping us all apprised of the latest
prune news from around the world, in the U.S., the California prune board
successfully pressured the FDA to change the name from
prunes to “dried plums”— which evidently evokes more of a
“positive ‘fresh fruit goodness’ image,” in hopes of attracting their
“target audience, women.” Of course, it might help if they actually
included one or two on their board. The name change is in hopes of
“de-emphasiz[ing] its connections to digestive regularity issues.” But, hey, why sell yourself short? Check this out: “Randomised clinical trial:
prunes vs. [Metamucil, also known as] psyllium.” “Constipation is a common
problem that affects up to [a fifth] of the world’s population. Nearly 60 million Americans suffer
from chronic constipation”— particularly a problem in
women and the elderly. A “pathological condition that is often
severe enough to disrupt daily activities, derange quality of life, respond
poorly to available medical remedies and [may] prompt sophisticated and
potentially harmful surgical procedures.” “Despite all this, it is still frequently
considered a trivial issue, and affected individuals
tend to self-medicate either using OTC laxatives
or ‘natural’ remedies, but none of these [have] been
adequately investigated,” until now.
Fiber supplements can be inconvenient,
taste nasty, cause bloating—even choking. So, we need “a food-based, natural,
convenient…tasty alternative.” But, do prunes actually work? Here’s the study subjects at baseline. Each dot is a complete,
spontaneous bowel movement. Note how many people had zero bowel
movements per week, at baseline. About an average of 1.7 a week,
which went up to 3.5 on prunes; a bowel movement every other day or so. Then, back to baseline, off of the prunes; then, on Metamucil, got up
to 2.8; then, back down. And, remember the Bristol stool scale? Significantly better stool
consistency on the prunes, as well. The researchers conclude that “treatment
with dried plums resulted in a greater improvement in constipation symptoms… [than the] commonly used
fibre supplement, psyllium.” So, “[g]iven their palatability,
tolerability…availability, dried plums should be considered” as a first-line therapy
for chronic constipation. If this is what adding
one plant can do— 3.5 bowel movements a week— what if all you ate was plants? Where do vegans rate? Going, going, gone. Not 2, not 3, but 10.9 a week..
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
The Best Diet for Hypothyroidism and Hyperthyroidism
"The Best Diet for Hypothyroidism
and Hyperthyroidism" There are several autoimmune diseases
that affect the thyroid gland, the most common being Graves' disease
and Hashimoto's thyroiditis. Graves' disease results in hyperthyroidism,
an overactive thyroid gland. Though slaughterhouses are
supposed to remove thyroid glands, should some neck meat slip in,
you can suffer a similar syndrome called hamburger thyrotoxicosis. But that's not from your body making
too much thyroid hormone; that's from your body eating
too much thyroid hormone. Graves' disease is much more common,
and meat-free diets may be able to help with both, as plant-based diets
may be associated with a low prevalence
of autoimmune disease in general, as observed, for example,
in rural sub-Saharan Africa.
Maybe it's because plants
are packed with antioxidants, which are possible protective factors
against autoimmune diseases. Maybe it's because plants are packed
with anti-inflammatory compounds. After all, a whole food plant-based diet
is basically synonymous with an anti-inflammatory diet. But you
don't know until you put it to the test. It turns out the exclusion of all
animal foods was associated with half the prevalence of hyperthyroidism
compared with omnivorous diets. Lacto-ovo vegetarian and
fish-only diets were associated with intermediate protection, but
a 52% lower odds of hyperthyroidism among those eating strictly
plant-based diets. This apparent protection may be due
to the exclusion of animal foods, the benefits of plant foods, or both. Animal foods, like meat, eggs,
and dairy products, may contain high estrogen concentrations,
for example, which have been linked to
autoimmunity in preclinical studies. Or the decrease in animal protein
may downregulate IGF-1, which is not just a cancer-
promoting growth hormone, but may play a role in
autoimmune diseases as well. Or it could be the good stuff in
plants that may protect cells, like the polyphenol phytochemicals,
such as flavonoids found in plant foods.
Maybe it's the environmental toxins
that build up in the food chain. For example, fish contaminated with
industrial pollutants, like PCBs, are associated with increased
frequency of thyroid disorders. Okay, what about the other autoimmune
thyroid disease, Hashimoto's thyroiditis, which, assuming you're getting
enough iodine, is the primary cause of hypothyroidism, an underactive
thyroid gland. Graves' disease wasn't the only autoimmune disorder
that was rare or virtually unknown among those living in rural sub-Saharan
Africa, eating near-vegan diets. They also appeared to have less
Hashimoto's. There's evidence that those with Hashimoto's have
compromised antioxidant status, but we don't know if
it's cause or effect. But if you look at the dietary factors
associated with blood levels of autoimmune anti-thyroid antibodies,
animal fats seem to be associated with higher levels, whereas vegetables and other plant
foods are associated with lower levels.
So again, anti-inflammatory
diets may be useful. No surprise, as Hashimoto's
is an inflammatory disease. That's what thyroiditis means:
inflammation of the thyroid gland. Another possibility is the reduction
in methionine intake, an amino acid concentrated in animal protein, thought
to be one reason why the consumption of whole plant foods is likely to have
a favorable influence on longevity, through decreasing the risk of cancer,
heart disease, and diabetes. And methionine restriction improves
thyroid function in mice, but it has yet to be put to the test
for Hashimoto's in humans. If you compare the poop of patients
with Hashimoto's to controls, the condition appears to be
related to a clear reduction in the concentration of Prevotella
species. Prevotella are good fiber-eating bugs known to enhance
anti-inflammatory activities. Decreased Prevotella levels
are also something you see in other autoimmune conditions, such as
multiple sclerosis and type 1 diabetes. How do you get more Prevotella?
Eat more plants.
But put a vegetarian on a diet
of meat, eggs, and dairy, and within as few as four days
you can drive down levels. So one would expect those eating plant-
based diets to have less Hashimoto's, but in a previous video I expressed
concern about insufficient iodine intake, which could also lead to hypothyroidism. So, which is it?
Let's find out. Vegan diets tended to be
associated with lower, not higher, risk of hypothyroid disease.
Why the word "tended"? Because the associated protection against
hypothyroidism incidence and prevalence studies did not reach
statistical significance. It wasn't just because they were slimmer. The lower risk existed even after controlling for body weight, so
they think maybe it's because animal products may induce inflammation. The question I have, though, is: if
someone who already has Hashimoto's, I mean, what happens
if you change their diet? That's exactly what I'll explore next..
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
Podcast: Treating Parkinson’s with Diet
You know the feeling you get
when you learn something new about a health problem
you’ve been trying to reverse? Maybe high blood pressure,
diabetes, or heart disease. Well, there’s nothing I like better
than bringing you the information that will help you do just that. Welcome to the
Nutrition Facts Podcast. I’m your host,
Dr. Michael Greger. Today we begin a
fascinating new series on treating Parkinson's
with diet. And we begin with a question: since Parkinson’s is caused by a
dopamine deficiency in the brain, what if you ate foods rich in the
dopamine precursor—levodopa? Two centuries have passed
since James Parkinson’s Essay on the Shaking Palsy described
a disease characterized by tremor and problems
with movement. Today, treatment options
include surgically implanting electrodes
into the brain. There has to be a better way. We’ve known since the 1950’s
that Parkinson’s disease is manifested by a dopamine
deficiency in the brain. Well then why not
eat a dopamine diet? A variety of fruits
and vegetables contain the same dopamine
made by our brain.
Unfortunately, dopamine can’t
cross the blood-brain barrier and hence is ineffective as therapy,
however the dopamine precursor, known as l-dopa or levodopa can
get from the blood up into the brain where it can then be converted
to dopamine within the brain by an enzyme called
decarboxylase. We don’t want the levodopa
to be converted to dopamine outside the brain because
then it can’t get in, so we give people a decarboxylase
inhibitor which itself can’t get into the brain, so that
keeps levodopa from prematurely turning into dopamine before it
gets into the brain where we need it. So eating dopamine-
rich foods doesn’t help, but what if we ate
levodopa-rich foods? More than 1500 years before
Dr.
Parkinson came on the scene, an Indian physician
seems to have nailed it and even suggested a
treatment, velvet beans, the plant with the
highest amount of L-DOPA. Hmm, so might
there be a way to forestall the epidemic
of Parkinson’s Disease through plant-based
remedies after all? Levodopa is the gold standard
therapy for Parkinson’s patients, but most Parkinson’s
patients in low-income areas cannot afford long-term
daily Levodopa therapy. In rural Africa, for example,
it is estimated that only 15% of patients are
treated with levodopa, because the daily cost of Levodopa
treatment is about a dollar day, which may be half of
what people make in a day. Same with other regions
in the Global South. L-DOPA is mostly
unavailable or unaffordable. So patients frequently
use powdered velvet beans as a replacement or
supplement to the drug. But does it work?
You never know… until you put it to the test. Velvet beans in Parkinson’s
Disease a randomized, double blind, clinical study,
and, a dose of 30g, which is about three tablespoons
led to a reliable and sustained antiparkinsonian effect
in all patients, working significantly
quicker than the drug, working significantly
longer than the drug, and working significantly
better than the drug, in another double-blind, randomized,
head-to-head crossover study.
The levodopa in velvet beans
appears to be 2–3 times more potent as compared to the
same dose of pill-form Levodopa, suspected to be because
there may be some intrinsic decarboxylase inhibitor
compound in the plant as well. OK, but those were
single dose studies. What about the chronic use of
velvet beans for Parkinson’s. Fourteen patients with
advanced Parkinson’s received roasted velvet bean powder
or the standard drug, switching back and forth for
months, looking at changes in quality of life,
activities of daily living, movement and
non-movement symptoms, and time with good mobility without troublesome involuntary
writhing movements and the velvet beans seemed
to work as well as the drug in all measures of efficacy,
including quality of life.
Despite the efficacy, the chances
of this cheap herbal remedy ever being licensed seems
unlikely—and for good reason. First of all, the stuff
evidently tastes nasty. And we don’t really
have good data going out more
than a few months. While velvet beans may
potentially be part of the answer to Parkinson's
disease management in low-income countries,
in high-income countries, one may be tempted
to prefer them to drugs just because it's a
"more natural therapy," but researchers discourage
patients and physicians to consider its use when
the drugs are available. So levodopa in pill
form should remain the first-line treatment
for Parkinson’s. However, velvet bean powder
may be better tolerated in certain patients. Psychologically, some patients
just have a thing against taking pills and so if they refuse, then certainly the
beans can step in. But otherwise, velvet bean
supplements suffer from the issues common to all
supplements, specifically lack of sufficient regulation
and quality control.
There’s all sorts of brands
out there, but there's no head-to-head comparisons
as to which is best, and the quality of the
products likely vary, but you don’t know… until you put it to the test. Six brands of velvet
bean product were ordered through the
internet and most of them four out of six showed a
large discrepancy between the claim on their label and
the actual L-Dopa content, and only two even came close. The remaining products
contained considerably less, less than 10% in two cases. Too bad there isn’t a food source
of L-dopa that you could just eat instead of taking in a supplement. Well, wait a second. L-dopa was originally discovered,
more than a century ago, in faba beans. Might eating faba beans
help with Parkinson’s? I’ll explore just that question, next.
Increased risk of Parkinson’s
disease has been associated with exposure to pesticides,
consumption of dairy products, a history of melanoma,
and traumatic brain injury. Why is the risk of Parkinson’s
disease increased among individuals with high milk
and dairy consumption? It could be the animal fat.
Maybe the animal protein. So why not a plant-food
diet for the risk and management of
Parkinson’s Disease? There are phytochemicals that
may target the underlying cause, but in terms of treatment,
ancient sacred texts from thousands of years ago refer to
trembling individuals who were prescribed a plant from the
bean family to treat the condition.
In my last video I talked
about the use of velvet beans, but in 1913 the miracle drug L-dopa
was discovered for the first time, in faba beans, also known
as fava beans or broad beans, as a natural source of
L-dopa to consider. The amount varies considerably
based on a number of factors, but typically it looks like
they have about 10 times less than velvet beans, but that’s okay
since you can eat larger quantities since fava beans are an actual food
instead of a powdered supplement. The important thing is that
amount of L-dopa in fava beans is enough to be pharmacologically
active in Parkinson’s disease. In fact, there are some reports
indicating that Parkinson’s patients might respond better to the beans than to standard L-dopa
preparations in pill form. But anecdotal reports that
patients may gain benefit from a broad bean rich
diet don’t cut it.
What you have to do… is put it to the test. Parkinson’s patients were
fed about one and a third cups of cooked fava beans, and
during the next four hours a substantial clinical
improvement was noted. In fact similar to the
improvement seen after receiving the standard pharmacological
combination of L-dopa plus carbidopa, the decarboxylase inhibitor drug
I talked about in the last video that boosts L-dopa
levels in the brain. No surprise that there
was a similar effect since they had very similar
L-dopa levels in the blood. In fact, half the time you could
hardly tell the beans from the drugs. How could there be the same levels if the bean L-dopa lacked
the carbidopa booster drug. Because fava beans may not
only be a natural source of L-dopa, but a natural source of
the carbidopa booster too. So the consumption of fava
beans has the potential to increase the levels of L-dopa
and carbidopa in the blood, with a marked improvement in
the muscle movement performance of the patients with Parkinson
disease, without any side effects.
In fact they work so well
you have to be careful about abruptly stopping them. There’s a condition called
neuroleptic malignant-like syndrome characterized by fever, rigidity,
all sorts of neurological problems, muscle breakdown, altered
levels of consciousness, which is usually precipitated
by an abrupt withdrawal of the L-dopa drug, caused by
an acute dopamine-deficient state. Well, you can see the same
thing if you’re treating your Parkinson’s with fava beans and then all of a
sudden you stop them. Alternative therapies carry
similar risks to traditional agents, because in this case they really
are the ultimate traditional agent. There are some downsides you
don’t see with the drug, though. Like fava-induced flatulence. You also have to be careful with
fava consumption if you’re on MAO inhibitor drugs often
used as anti-depressants, since there can be
drug interactions. And then there's the risk of a
condition known as favism.
There's a genetic mutation that
occurs in about 1 in 20 people, and at even higher rates
in those of African, Asian, and Mediterranean descent, in which people lack an enzyme
that’s necessary to detoxify certain compounds
found in fava beans, and without the enzyme
fava bean consumption can cause your red
blood cells to rupture. Thankfully, genetic testing for
this mutation is widely available and affordable, and so it seems
prudent to screen patients with Parkinson’s for this favism, what's called G6PD
deficiency mutation, prior to putting them on
daily fava bean consumption.
If you want to give
fava beans a try. fresh green fava beans have
significantly more L-dopa than dried, so much so that dried fava beans may not provide any
clinical benefits. Roasting and boiling removes
some or even all of the L-dopa, though other studies have
found that about a half cup of cooked favas contain
approximately 250 mg. Sprouted favas may have the
most, increasing up until day 9, by which time the indigestible
flatulence sugars may be eliminated, offering another advantage
of fava bean sprouting. But you don’t know if
fava bean sprouts help… until you put them to the test. Researchers fed Parkinson’s
patients a salad with about a half cup of freshly
chopped fava sprouts and observed substantial
clinical improvement. Other beans, just like
regular beans also naturally have L-DOPA, though
at lower amounts. Soybeans have a bonus
compound that may act as an L-dopa boosting
carbidopa compound.
What if you fed
people soybeans on top of their regular
Parkinson’s meds? Given people just one and a half
spoonful’s worth of roasted soybeans led to a significant improvement
over the drugs alone with significantly fewer involuntary
movements hours later. Until more information is available,
Parkinson’s combo drugs like Sinemet should remain
the first-line therapy, but adding beans to one’s
diet may only help. We would love it if you could
share with us your stories about reinventing your health
through evidence-based nutrition. Go to nutritionfacts.org/testimonials. We may share it on our social
media to help inspire others.
To see any graphs, charts, graphics,
images, or studies mentioned here, please go to the Nutrition Facts
Podcast landing page. There you’ll find all the
detailed information you need – plus, links to all of the sources
we cite for each of these topics. My last two books are
“How to Survive a Pandemic” and the “How Not to Diet Cookbook”. Stay tuned for December 5, 2023 for the launch of my new one,
How Not to Age. And, of course, all the proceeds
I receive from the sales of all my books goes
directly to charity.
NutritionFacts.org is a nonprofit,
science-based public service, where you can sign up
for free daily updates on the latest in nutrition research
via bite-sized videos and articles. Everything on the
website is free. There’s no ads, no
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I’m not selling anything. I just put it up as a public service,
as a labor of love, as a tribute to
my grandmother, whose own life was saved
with evidence-based nutrition..
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
Update on Vegetarian Stroke Risk
"Update on Vegetarian Stroke Risk" Healthy plant-based diets
have been associated with lower all-cause mortality,
up to a 34 percent lower risk of death from any cause over an average
of an eight-year period, just being in the top
versus bottom quarter of healthy plant-based consumption. If sustained, that could translate
into more than four extra years of life. A meta-analysis of a dozen studies
prospectively following more than a half a million people
for up to 25 years similarly found significantly lower
heart disease and overall death rates among those eating more plant-based.
No surprise,
a systematic review concluded since plant-based diets
may arrest or even reverse our number one killer—
cardiovascular disease. Those eating wholly plant-based
tend to be significantly slimmer with lower LDL cholesterol, triglycerides,
blood sugars, blood pressures, significantly less inflammation,
and less carotid artery wall thickening (a sign of atherosclerosis measured
via ultrasound in the neck), as good as what you see
in endurance athletes who’ve run an average of 50,000 miles,
which is like twice around the globe. And changes in risk factors
can happen fast, as evidenced by results
from one to three-week ad libitum (eat-all-you-want)
plant-based “kickstart” programs. For example, the results from the first
few hundred participants of the at-home
15-day Jumpstart program created by the nonprofit Rochester
Lifestyle Medicine Institute were recently published. On a whole food plant-based diet,
obese patients lost an average of 7 pounds without controlling portions
or counting calories or carbs.
Diabetics saw their fasting blood sugars
drop 28 points. Those with LDL cholesterol
over 100 experienced a 33-point drop (comparable to some statin drugs), and hypertensive individuals
experienced a 17-point drop in systolic blood pressure,
which is better than drugs, and all within just two weeks! Studies dating back nearly 40 years
show those eating meat-free diets also have improved blood “rheology,”
meaning fluidity or flowability, which may play a role
in cardiovascular protection. Subsequent interventional studies putting
the cross-sectional findings to the test, show that switching people
to a plant-based diet can improve rheology measurements
within three to six weeks. But might the blood of vegetarians flow
a bit too well, though? In 2019, a study of thousands
of British vegetarians called EPIC-Oxford found that they were at higher risk
of hemorrhagic (bleeding) stroke. They had such a lower risk
of heart disease that they still had less
cardiovascular disease overall (and a half dozen studies show no overall
increased risk of stroke mortality), but why the greater stroke incidence? I suggested it might be vitamin B12
deficiency, which can lead to excessive levels
of a stroke- associated metabolite called homocysteine
which is normally detoxified by B12. This is thought to be the reason
why vitamin B12 supplementation can improve artery function
of vegetarians.
Vitamin B12 supplements
or fortified foods are critical for anyone eating plant-based,
but my 12-part video series on vegetarians and stroke risk
triggered by the 2019 publication was all in vain. It turns out vegetarians don’t appear
to have higher stroke risk after all. In response to the EPIC-Oxford results,
researchers around the world scrambled to see if the findings
were merely a fluke. In 2020, UK Biobank, a massive study
following more than 400,000 volunteers, confirmed that vegetarians
had lower cardiovascular disease rates and importantly,
no increased incidence of stroke. And two studies from Taiwan
found vegetarians had significantly
lower risk of stroke. Following tens of thousands
of vegetarians for up to ten years, they only had about half the stroke risk
compared to nonvegetarians (including a 64 percent lower risk
specifically of hemorrhagic stroke). By 2021, Harvard researchers
had finished and published their analyses of the 200,000+ participants
of the Nurses’ Health Study, the Nurses’ Health Study II, and the Health Professionals
Follow-Up Study. They too found no increased stroke risk
for vegetarians and indeed a decreased risk of stroke among those eating
healthy plant-based diets.
A meta-analysis putting all the studies
together found that indeed the EPIC-Oxford data appeared
to be a fluke after all, finding, if anything, a lower risk
of stroke in a subgroup analysis. A 2022 systematic review
concluded that vegetarian and low-animal product diets are associated with a significantly
lower risk of bleeding strokes, a significantly lower risk
of clotting strokes, and a significantly lower risk
of total strokes across the board..
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
The Impacts of Plant-Based Diets on Breast Cancer and Prostate Cancer
"Impacts of Plant-Based Diets
on Breast Cancer and Prostate Cancer" There appears to be
a significant protective effect of a vegetarian diet for heart disease
and all cancers combined, particularly for those eating vegan,
but that’s for total cancer. What about breast cancer
and prostate cancer specifically? There’s been about a half dozen studies
on breast cancer risk and various plant-based dietary patterns,
and they all found lower risk, as expected. In some studies, vegetarians
had less than half the odds of breast cancer
compared to nonvegetarians, suggesting vegetarian diets
show a protective role against breast cancer risk. In another study, eating
a nonvegetarian diet was one of the important risk factors, nearly tripling the odds
of breast cancer. In the California Teachers Study, a more plant-based pattern was associated
with a significant reduction in breast cancer risk as well.
So, even trending in that direction
towards a greater consumption of, for example, fruits
and vegetables is associated with a reduced
breast cancer risk, particularly for the hardest
to treat tumors, which is interesting, offering a potential
avenue for prevention. Some of the reductions in risk
were only statistically significant if you included the weight loss benefits
of plant-based eating and associated lifestyle factors
and other reductions of risk, not statistically significant regardless. Lower risk but not significant. Lower risk but not significant,
meaning like in half of these studies, the lower risk may have just been
statistical flukes by chance.
Okay, but this, for example,
was for vegetarians. Do vegan women do any better? Vegetarian diets seem to offer
protection from cancers of the gastrointestinal tract;
whereas vegan diets seem to confer lower risk of all cancers
put together and female-specific cancers,
in particular, which included breast cancer
but also included cervical, endometrial, and ovarian cancer. After a few more years, they were able
to tease out the breast cancer data, and vegans showed consistently
lower risk estimates, but not statistically significantly. So, one study in India even suggested
that vegetarians who eat eggs have lower risk
than vegetarians who don’t.
But, put all the studies on egg intake
and breast cancer together, and eating like one egg a day—
five or more eggs a week— appears to increase
breast cancer risk compared to not eating
any eggs at all. An increase of five eggs
a week was also associated with a 47 percent increase
in fatal prostate cancer. In general, if you look
at the effect of plant- and animal-based foods
on prostate cancer risk, most studies showed that plant-based
foods are associated with either decreased
or neutral risk of prostate cancer, whereas animal-based foods,
particularly dairy products, are associated with either
increased or neutral risk. The dairy and eggs may be why all
three studies on prostate cancer in vegans found decreased risk, but half of the vegetarian
studies showed no change. It’s not just about avoiding
meat, though. Vegetables and beans specifically
were also associated with lower risk, and the same
with breast cancer. High intakes of vegetables and pulses,
like beans, lentils, and chickpeas, were associated with protection
against breast cancer. We’re talking about half
the odds of breast cancer eating four or more
vegetable dishes a day or a daily serving
of beans or lentils, regardless of whether you eat meat.
Note this is one of the studies
that only showed that non-statistically significant drop
in risk among vegetarians; so, it may be better
to be a meat-eater who eats lots of greens and beans
compared to a vegetarian who instead eats lots of junk. Now, diet recommendations should go
beyond just pushing a specific array of foods and really just
promote the overall benefits of eating more
whole plant foods in general. But what happens if you do
just push more veggies? You don’t know…until
you put it to the test: "Effect of a Behavioral Intervention
to Increase Vegetable Consumption on Cancer Progression Among Men
With Early-Stage Prostate Cancer." Oh, that’s exciting, trying
increased vegetable intake to not just prevent
but treat cancer. Men with biopsy-proven prostate cancer
were randomized to an encouragement to eat seven
or more servings of vegetables a day.
Nice! And the control group
was just given some generic dietary info. And…among men with early-stage
prostate cancer under active surveillance,
a behavioral intervention that increased vegetable consumption
did not significantly reduce the risk of prostate cancer progression. Bummer. But wait a second. The trial wasn’t testing
increased vegetable consumption, but the effect of advice
to eat more vegetables. Did they actually do it? The behavioral intervention
in this study produced robust, sustained increases in
vegetable intake for two years, the researchers wrote. But alas,
it still didn’t work. At the end of those two years,
they were eating two more servings. Wait, just two, not seven? And so, the difference
between the vegetable group and the control group
was less than two servings.
They were also supposed to get at least
two servings of tomatoes a day, and two servings of broccoli-
type cruciferous vegetables every day; yet, they ended up only eating
about an ounce of cruciferous, and less than a tenth
of a serving of tomatoes. So, with so little dietary change,
it’s no wonder there was so little change
in the cancer. Though it’s possible
you also have to cut down on animal foods. In this three-month study for men
who had prostate cancer come back after surgery
and radiation, they were able to boost plant foods,
restrict animal foods, actually eat some more tomatoes. And the average PSA
doubling time (meaning how fast
the tumor was growing) slowed from about 22 months
to 59 months. So, doubling in less than two years
to then taking nearly five years.
All just from a three-
month dietary intervention, whereas the control group
didn’t change. Now, slowing down
a tumor is nice, but how about reversing its growth
or shrinking it down? Are strict vegetarians protected
against prostate cancer? Yes, those eating strictly plant-
based diets have only a fraction of the risk of getting it
in the first place, but that’s not the half of it. Yes, the Ornish study. I’ve talked about this before, notable in my How Not
to Die from Cancer video. Randomize men with prostate cancer
to a diet packed with fruits, vegetables,
whole grains, and beans and tumors on average
appeared to shrink, as noted by PSA trending down, while the control group’s cancer
continued to grow. Drip some blood from the plant-
based group on some prostate cancer growing in a petri dish,
and the plant-based blood suppressed the cancer growth
almost eight times better.
And the more
they stuck to their diet, the more their bloodstream
suppressed the cancer growth..
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
Plant-Based Protein: Are Pea and Soy Protein Isolates Harmful?
"Plant-Based Protein: Are Pea
and Soy Protein Isolates Harmful?" So, are these plant-based
burgers healthy or not? And the answer is…
compared to what? Eating is kind of a zero-sum game;
every food has an opportunity cost. I mean, every time we
put something in our mouth it’s a lost opportunity to put
something even healthier in our mouth. So, if you want to know
if something is healthy, you have to compare it to
what you’d be eating instead. So, for example,
are eggs healthy? Compared to a breakfast
link sausage? Yes! But compared to oatmeal?
Not even close. But look, sausage is considered
a group 1 carcinogen. In other words, we know consumption
of processed meat causes cancer. Each 50-gram serving a day,
that’s a single breakfast link, was linked to an 18% higher
risk of colorectal cancer. So, the risk of getting colorectal
cancer eating one link a day is about the same as the increased
risk of lung cancer you’d get breathing secondhand smoke all
day living with a smoking spouse.
So, compared to sausage,
eggs are healthy, but compared to oatmeal,
eggs are not. So, when it comes to Beyond Meat
and Impossible Burger, yeah, they may be better in
that they have less saturated fat, but, hey, you want
less saturated fat? Plant-based meat
alternatives are no match for unprocessed plant foods,
such as beans or lentils. And a bean burrito or lentil
soup could certainly fill the same culinary niche
as a lunchtime burger. But if you are going to
have some kind of burger, it’s easy to argue that the
plant-based versions are healthier. There is a sodium issue, and
it’s not that much, if any, lower, in saturated fat, since
they use coconut oil, which is basically just
as bad as animal fat; there’s not much
advantage on that front. Though the total protein is
similar across the board, does this matter? Or Is there any
advantage to eating plant protein over animal protein?
Let’s look at the association between animal and plant
protein intake and mortality.
In the twin Harvard cohorts,
following more than 100,000 men and women over decades, “…after
adjusting for other dietary and lifestyle factors, animal
protein intake was associated with a higher risk [of] mortality,
particularly [dying from cardiovascular disease], whereas
higher plant protein intake was associated with
[a] lower all-cause mortality”, meaning a lower risk of dying
from all causes put together. So, “replacing animal protein
of various origins with plant protein was associated
with lower mortality”, especially if you’re replacing
processed meat and egg protein, which were the worst. But when
it comes to living a longer life, plant protein sources beat out
each and every animal protein source. Not just better
than bacon and eggs, but better than burgers, chicken,
turkey, fish, and dairy protein. Together with other studies, these
“findings support the importance of protein sources for the
long-term health outcome and suggest plants constitute
a preferred protein source compared [to] animal foods.” Why? Well, unlike animal protein, plant
protein has not been associated with increased levels
of the cancer-promoting growth hormone IGF-1, for example.
Now, soy protein is similar
enough to animal protein that at high enough doses, like eating
two Impossible Burgers a day, you may bump your IGF-1. But the only reason we care
about IGF-1 is cancer risk, and if anything, higher soy
intake is associated with a decreased risk of cancer. For example, a recent systematic
review and meta-analysis found that soy protein intake was
associated with a decreased risk in breast cancer mortality;
we’re talking “a 12 percent reduction in breast cancer death
[associated with] each 5-gram-a-day increase in soy protein intake.” But the high soy groups
in these studies were on the order of
more than 16 grams a day, associated with a
whopping 62% lower risk of dying from breast cancer.
More than 10 grams of soy
protein a day may be good, associated with cutting
breast cancer mortality risk nearly in half, and getting
more than 16 grams a day may be better, which is like
one Impossible Burger a day. But we simply don’t know what happens at consumption levels far above that. Plant protein has also been
linked to lower blood pressure, reduced LDL cholesterol, and
improved insulin sensitivity. No wonder “substitution of
plant protein for animal protein has been related to a lower incidence of cardiovascular disease
and type 2 diabetes.” Indeed, 21 different studies following
nearly a half million people, and “high… animal protein
intakes [were] associated with an increased risk of [type 2 diabetes], whereas [even just] moderate
plant protein intake is associated with a decreased
risk of [type 2 diabetes].” OK, but these were just
observational studies. They all tried to control for other
dietary and lifestyle factors, but you can’t prove cause-and-effect,
until…you put it to the test.
The “Effect of Replacing Animal
Protein with Plant Protein on [blood sugar] Control in
Diabetes: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of
Randomized Controlled Trials.” Even just switching out about
a third of your protein from animal to plant sources
yielded significant improvements in long-term blood sugar control,
and fasting blood sugars, and insulin. You can do the same thing
looking at cholesterol.
Here’s a systematic review and
meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials on the effect
of plant protein on blood fats. And indeed, swapping in plant
protein for animal protein decreases LDL cholesterol,
and this benefit occurs whether you start out at high
cholesterol or low cholesterol, whether you’re swapping out
dairy, or meat, and eggs, and whether you’re swapping in
soy or other plant proteins. We’ve known about the beneficial
effects of soy on cholesterol going back nearly 40 years, but
other sources of plant protein can do it as well. Yeah, but
we’re not swapping beans for beef. These products are mostly
just isolated plant proteins, mostly pea protein isolate
in the case of Beyond, and concentrated soy protein
in the case of Impossible.
If you just isolate out
the plant proteins themselves are you still going to get benefits? Yes, surprisingly. Check it out. Interestingly, the researchers
concluded, that they did not find a significant difference between
protein isolate products and whole food sources, “suggesting
that the cholesterol-lowering effects are at least, in part, attributable to the plant protein
itself rather than just the associated nutrients.” So, it’s not just because
plant protein travels with fiber or less saturated fat. Plant proteins break down
into a different distribution of amino acids; and so, it’s
like if you give people arginine, an amino acid found
more in plant foods, that alone can bring
down people’s cholesterol. And even plant protein concentrates
used in these products aren’t pure protein, retaining
a few active compounds such as phytosterols and antioxidants, which also can have beneficial effects..
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
Can Alzheimer’s Disease Be Reversed with a Plant Based Diet?
"Can Alzheimer's Disease Be Reversed
with a Plant Based Diet?" Dr. Dean Ornish was
the first to show, in a randomized
controlled trial, that a plant-based diet
and lifestyle program could apparently reverse
the progression of our number one killer,
heart disease. Opening up arteries without
drugs, without surgery. Then, he showed the same
plant-based program could potentially
reverse the course of early-stage
prostate cancer and also elongate
telomeres, suggesting an anti-
aging effect as well. But when he told me
he was going to see if he could reverse the progression
of Alzheimer's disease, I was skeptical. Surely, he was biting off a little
more than he could chew. Dementia is the most
feared condition of later life. There’s a common
misconception that we have no control over whether we
develop dementia, but the good news is that although Alzheimer’s
may be incurable, at least it is preventable. There is an emerging consensus that “what’s good for our hearts
is also good for our heads,” because clogging of the
arteries inside the brain with atherosclerotic plaque
is thought to play a role in the development of
Alzheimer’s dementia.
This is what our cerebral
arteries should look like: open, clean, and
allowing blood to flow throughout our brain. This is what atherosclerosis
in our head looks like: clogged with cholesterol,
closing off our arteries, and clamping down
on blood flow. What kind of brain arteries do
you want in your head? Too much cholesterol
in our blood is unanimously recognized
to be a risk factor for the development
of Alzheimer’s disease. Those with a total cholesterol
of 225 mg/dL or more may have nearly
25 times the odds of ending up with amyloid
plaques in their brain 10 to 15 years later. After all, what is the
Alzheimer’s gene, APOE? It codes for the major cholesterol
carrier inside the brain. This may explain the
so-called Nigerian paradox: They have among the highest
rates of the Alzheimer’s gene but some of the lowest
rates of Alzheimer’s disease. How is that possible? Genes load the gun,
but lifestyle pulls the trigger. The paradox may be explained
by their low cholesterol levels, probably due to their
diets low in animal fat. So, in terms of dietary guidelines
for the prevention of Alzheimer’s, we should center our
diets around vegetables, legumes, fruits,
and whole grains.
In other words, the dietary
pillar of lifestyle medicine: whole food,
plant-based nutrition. Or, if that’s too complicated,
"plants, plants, and more plants." That may help explain
why vegetarians may be up to three times less likely
to become demented later in life. But it’s not all-or-nothing. Even just substituting 5%
of animal protein with plant protein appears to significantly reduce
the risk of dying from dementia. But prevention isn’t sexy. When prevention works,
nothing happens, but the same diet and lifestyle
that helps prevent heart disease was proven to
help reverse it. Until then, it was believed
that heart disease progression could only be slowed,
not stopped or reversed, similar to how Alzheimer’s
disease is viewed today. So, what if you put
people with Alzheimer’s on the same plant-
based program? You don’t know until
you put it to the test. A randomized,
controlled, phase 2 clinical trial to see if the progression
of Alzheimer’s disease may be slowed, stopped,
or perhaps even reversed.
They randomized about
50 men and women diagnosed with early-
stage Alzheimer’s to either make no lifestyle
changes for 20 weeks or eat a whole food,
plant-based diet (with supplements
like vitamin B12), moderate exercise (like walking half
an hour a day), stress management (like relaxing with
breathing exercises), and getting group
support (over Zoom). They measured
standard tests of cognition and function
before and after in each group, as well as objective
experimental biomarkers of disease progression. On the Clinical Dementia
Rating Global scale, which is used to stage
the severity of dementia, the control group
continued to get worse, but the diet and lifestyle
group started to get better. People diagnosed with
Alzheimer’s getting better? The same seemed to
happen when measured with the Alzheimer’s Disease
Assessment Scale, though this did not reach
statistical significance. Using what’s called the Clinical Dementia Rating
Sum of Boxes scoring, both groups
continued to deteriorate, but the decline was significantly
less in the healthy living group. Overall, using
what’s called the Clinical Global Impression
of Change scoring, most of the people in the
control group kept getting worse and none showed any improvement,
which is what you'd expect with Alzheimer's, whereas about 40% of those
in the diet and lifestyle group appeared to be getting
better within five months of eating and
living healthier.
Why did some get
better and others not? Well, the more they complied
with the recommendations, the greater the beneficial impact
on their cognition and function. This helps to
explain why studies of less-intensive
lifestyle interventions were not sufficient to
stop disease progression, let alone actually improve
cognition and function. The biggest limitation
of the study is that, unlike drug trials where
you can give people a disguised placebo
sugar pill, when a study involves major
diet and lifestyle changes, you can’t rule out
the placebo effect, especially for self-
reported, subjective “How’s your memory been?”
type-questions. But the researchers
also measured objective investigational biomarkers
of disease progression and saw the same
trajectory— improvements in the
interventional group and worsening in
the control group, with the same apparent
dose-response effect, meaning the more they improved
their diet and lifestyle, the more dramatic the effect.
Compare that to the
latest Alzheimer’s drugs, which may not
even work at all. All you may get
for your $56,000 is a one-in-three chance of
swelling or bleeding in your brain. When the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration approved the
drug anyway, the head of the American
Geriatrics Society replied, “My head just exploded.” The bottom line is
there is only one diet that's ever been shown to help
reverse our leading cause of death, heart disease,
in the majority of patients: a plant-based diet. If that’s all a plant-
based diet could do— reverse the number one
killer of men and women, then shouldn’t that be the default
diet until proven otherwise? And the fact that it
can also be so effective in preventing, arresting,
and reversing the progression of
other leading killers, like high blood pressure,
type 2 diabetes, and now maybe even early-
stage Alzheimer’s disease would seem to make the
case for plant-based eating simply overwhelming..
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
Why Might Vegetarians Have Less HPV?
"Why Might Vegetarians
Have Less HPV?" Cervical cancer is now considered a
sexually transmitted disease, originally suspected as such
as it was supposedly found less in nuns and
more in prostitutes, but now we have DNA fingerprinting
proof that virtually all cervical cancer is caused by a sexually transmitted virus,
human papilloma virus, which also causes cancers of the penis,
vagina, vulva, and throat.
HPV is considered a necessary,
but not sufficient cause of cancer. Most young women contract HPV,
but most don't get cervical cancer, because their immune systems
are able to clear out the virus. 70% of women clear the infection within
1 year and more than 90% within 2 years before the virus can
cause cancer, unless you're immuno-
compromised or something. Well, if that's the case, may
maybe those with particularly strong immune systems
might clear the virus even faster. That's what may be behind this new
study that found that vegetarian women appear to have significantly
lower infection rates with HPV.
It's one of many studies reporting
that vegetarians have lower risk of HPV infection thought to be because of the presence of more fruits
and vegetables in their diet, which are rich sources of
all sorts of good phytonutrients. So for example, if you take a bunch
of women with cancer-causing strains of HPV infecting
their cervix and follow them out,
and retest at 3 months, and then 9 months, while analyzing
their diets, what do you find? Higher levels of vegetable
consumption may cut the risk of HPV
persistence in half, double one's likelihood of clearing this
potentially cancer-causing infection. And "higher" levels just meant
like 2 or more servings a day! What do antioxidants in plants
have to do with viral diseases? Different antioxidants affect
different viruses in different ways, but against HPV…don't you know that electrophoretic
mobility super shift assays showed "irrespective of enhanced c-fos
expression, c-jun was phosphorylated and became primarily
heterodimerized with fra-1", "which was also induced
after PDTC incubation"…I mean duh! I had to read this
paper like 5 times! Long story short: antioxidants
appear to suppress the activation of critical segments
of the virus' DNA.
Maybe that's why smearing green tea
on genital warts – also caused by HPV – has been found so effective
in clearing them. In terms of preventing cervical cancer:
through their role as antioxidants, pytonutrients like lutein, found
in dark green leafy vegetables; and lycopene, the red pigment in
tomatoes, may decrease viral load, thereby decreasing persistence
and progression to disease. Whereas the protective associations
may be due to their antioxidant properties. They have all sorts of other wonderful
effects, so who knows… who cares! Bottom line: "higher
consumption of vegetables may decrease risk
of HPV persistence," which may help explain
why this 2013 study found vegan women
have significantly lower rates of all female cancers combined,
including cancer of the cervix.
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
Is It OK to Eat Small Meals Frequently? | Sadhguru Answers
you may not feel lethargy because you are eating small meals but you cannot stop the digestive process if you want to be at your full potential within an hour and a half to two your stomach should be empty when there is food in the stomach the excretory system shuts down almost coal and not being clean means you're asking for problem so if you know human body from within you yourself look at this just see how your body feels when there's food in the stomach and how your body feels when the stomach is empty you will see your body and your brain will work at its best when your stomach is empty if food is constantly being processed in your digestive system a certain amount of energy naturally is gone there so your both your brain and body will not function at their best you may not feel lethargy because you are eating small meals but you cannot stop the digestive process when digestive process happens for every other animal after they eat they sit down they just sit down because there is not enough energy for other things whether carnivorous or herbivorous animals after they eat they sit down and that is a natural need within a human being also after he eats he would like to sit down because there is not enough energy for other things now you think by eating small meals through the day you can be active throughout the day you can be but not at your full potential if you want to be at your full potential you must keep your body and your metabolism of the body in such a way whatever whatever you eat whatever you eat within one and a half to two and a half hours your stomach must be empty this is what yoga always insists within an hour and a half to two your stomach should be empty stomach being empty does not mean hunger only when the energy levels run down you feel hunger otherwise stomach must be empty only when the stomach is empty stomach means stomach bag the food would have moved to other areas of the intestine in the intestine the process is very different that's not digestion that's assimilation there it doesn't take much energy it's a digestive process when the food is in the stomach bag at that time it's best to keep your activity at low now throughout the day if there's food in the stomach then you bring down your whole potential of life one more aspect when there is food in the stomach when the digestive process is happening the excretory system shuts down almost eighty percent of it shuts down when I say excretory system it's on the cellular level the purification of the body is happening that will shut down at least 80 percent or in other words all the impurities which had to move out of the system will not move out which will create various problems for you over a period of time and if you eat at different times even your excretory system from the intestines will not happen efficiently for you because the waste matter doesn't come at a certain time into the colon it will come at different times so you will have problem with that also so throughout the day your colon also won't be clean coal and not being clean means you're asking for problems the colon should be clean always and yoga there's enormous importance to this in any of the traditional systems you will see if you go to an ayurvedic doctor or a receipt or anybody first thing is he'll Purge you because he knows that most of your problems are because of unclean colon and the way people are eating today keeping the colon clean is going to be a big challenge for them suppose you eat one big meal like we normally do one big meal and uh either we don't eat anything else or if we are too active maybe we eat a fruit or something you will see your colon will always remain clean and people should try this they must Purge themselves one day and see how it feels suddenly there is something light and beautiful about you every day that's how you're supposed to feel [Music] [Applause] [Applause]
Video Transcript – As found on YouTube
