1. Diet variety: best predictor of health
Eating more fruits, vegetables, fish, legumes and whole grains may protect against stroke, finds a new study that says a person's complete eating pattern is the best way to predict health and disease.
2. Atkins diet may reduce fertility: new research
The Atkins diet could reduce a woman's chances of becoming pregnant, according to new research from European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology. Scientists have found that high-protein diets, such as that advocated by the Atkins regime, are linked to increased rates of pregnancy failure in the early stages of conception.
3. Flaxseed and prostate cancer: possible protection
A study of mice in the medical journal Urology shows that flaxseed in the diet helped improve prostate tumors (reducing their size and severity), and even prevented some of the mice from developing the disease.
Food pyramid revision: US moves afoot
The Department of Agriculture's review of the food guide pyramid was centre stage at the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) Annual Meeting when experts looked at what a new food pyramid could mean for the food industry.
Low-carb dieters: watch for the fall-out
Food manufacturers should think twice before jumping on the low-carb band-wagon, as an increasing number of reports suggest that this fad is slowly running out of favour with consumers. A survey published by the Harman Group in the US found that Americans find low-carb diets twice as difficult to stick to as all other diets.
Heart health tip: legumes good for heart disease
Eating plenty of legumes - such as lima beans, kidney beans and black-eyed peas - can reduce your risk of heart disease and stroke and help prevent cancer, according to Duke University Medical Centre in the US.
Colon Cancer, osteoporosis and vitamin D: 20 per cent reduction
A US cancer prevention expert says that, if government required calcium and vitamin D to be added to cereal grain products, there would be a 20 per cent reduction in colon cancer deaths and osteoporosis-related fractures.
Eating more fruits, vegetables, fish, legumes and whole grains may protect against stroke, finds a new study that says a person's complete eating pattern is the best way to predict health and disease.
Several foods types such as fibre or omega-3 fatty acids have individually been held up as strong protective agents against heart disease on their own. But Teresa Fung, the study's lead author and assistant professor of nutrition at Simmons College School for Health Studies in Boston said, because nutrients and food are consumed in combination, their cumulative effect on disease risk may be best investigated by considering the entire eating pattern.
Professor Fung also said that overall dietary patterns are easier to recommend to the public than individual foods.
While her approach needs to be confirmed by further studies, it could be an important strategy for marketers of health and functional foods.
In Europe there are around 650,000 stroke deaths each year. Smoking, obesity, high cholesterol and physical inactivity are all controllable risk factors for the event, and are driving a rapidly growing heart health foods market.
For the new study, published in the rapid access issue of Stroke, researchers gathered dietary information on 71,768 female nurses, aged 38-63, who had no history of heart disease or diabetes. Starting in 1984 and following them until 1998, researchers identified two dietary patterns: 'prudent' and 'Western', consisting of red and processed meats, refined grains, and sugary desserts.
During 14 years of follow-up, the nurses were scored on how closely their diet resembled both the prudent dietary pattern and again on closeness to the 'Western' pattern. A higher score indicated closer adherence to the dietary pattern. The women were ranked according to the scores, then divided into five groups (quintiles), with one group of quintiles for each type of diet.
After controlling for lifestyle and risk factors for stroke, the risk for any type of stroke among women with the highest Western diet scores was 58 per cent greater than the risk for women in the lowest quintile. The increased risk for ischaemic stroke was about 56 per cent greater.
While the results show that risk of any stroke for women with the highest prudent diet score was 22 per cent lower than women with the lowest prudent diet score, these results were not statistically significant.
Women with Western eating habits were more likely to smoke, less likely to take vitamins and less active, the study also found.
Women who ate the Western diet and also had hypertension had more than three times the risk of strokes caused by blockages compared with Western dieters without hypertension.
The researchers concluded that more diet studies using food patterns would help determine if this is the most effective way to identify disease risk.
The Atkins diet could reduce a woman's chances of becoming pregnant, according to new research. Scientists have found that high-protein diets, such as that advocated by the Atkins regime, are linked to increased rates of pregnancy failure in the early stages of conception.
Research showing that women who are trying to become pregnant should not adopt protein-rich diets was presented at the annual meeting of the European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) in Berlin.
Scientists from the Colorado Centre for Reproductive Medicine in the United States fed mice on a diet made up of 25 per cent protein and compared them with mice on a normal diet. Both sets of rodents were then impregnated. The mice on increased protein were found to have a fourfold increase in levels of the chemical ammonium in their reproductive tracts. Ammonium has been linked to problems in mice embryos, such as delayed development and genetic defects.
The embryos from the high-protein mice had fewer cell numbers and a higher rate of cell death, at a crucial stage in embryonic development, just before the embryo attaches to the inside of the womb. Without implantation, pregnancy cannot occur.
The early-stage embryos from both sets of mice were implanted into a third group who had been fed a normal-protein diet. Only 65 per cent of those taken from high protein mice developed into a foetus. Embryos from mice on the lower protein diet had an 81 per cent success rate.
Atkins followers are told to minimise their carbohydrate intake but can eat unlimited amounts of protein, such as meat. While the mice were fed a 25 per cent protein diet, Atkins adherents tend to eat 35 per cent protein during the first induction and weight loss stages of the diet, and are then recommended to remain at 25 per cent for the 'maintenance' phase.
The lead researcher, Dr David Gardner, said: "It is conceivable that people who have protein intakes greater than 30 per cent may have problems conceiving. These findings mean that it would be prudent to advise couples who are trying to conceive, either naturally or through [fertility treatment], to ensure that the woman's protein intake is less than 20 per cent of their total energy consumption. The available data certainly indicate that a high protein diet is not advisable while trying to conceive."
Dr Stuart Trager, medical director of Atkins Nutritionals, said: "There was no mention of carbohydrate control in the research conducted by Dr Gardner. The study subjects were mice, which are herbivores. Whether or not these findings or effects would apply to humans is unknown."
A study of mice in the medical journal Urology shows that flaxseed in the diet helped improve prostate tumors (reducing their size and severity), and even prevented some of the mice from developing the disease.
"We are cautiously optimistic about these findings," says lead study investigator Wendy Demark-Wahnefried, PhD, associate professor of urology at Duke University Medical Center, in a news release.
Other studies have suggested that dietary fiber reduces cancer risk, and that omega-3 fatty acids have a protective benefit against cancer. Flaxseed is the richest plant source of omega-3 fatty acids and is high in fiber. Flaxseed is also a source of lignan, a specific family of fiber-related compounds that appear to play a role in hormone metabolism.
Since testosterone may be important in the progression of prostate cancer, lignan could help inhibit the growth and development of the disease.
In her study, Demark-Wahnefried used mice that were genetically engineered to develop prostate cancer; the mice were divided into a study group and a control group. The control group ate a normal mouse diet; 5% of the study group's diet was in the form of flaxseed.
Half of the mice in both groups were fed their respective diets for 20 weeks, then tested for tumor growth and spread of the cancer. The rest of the mice were fed the diets for 30 weeks, then their tumors were tested.
"Tumors in the untreated control group were twice the size of tumors in the flaxseed group," reports researcher Xu Lin, MD, PhD, a professor of urology and researcher in the Center for Aging and Human Development at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C.
The tumors were less aggressive in the flaxseed group -- they tended not to grow as fast; two of the mice in the flaxseed group did not develop prostate cancer at all. The flaxseed group also had fewer cases of cancer spreading to other organs, although that finding was not statistically significant, Lin says.
However, Demark-Wahnefried cautions: "The amount of flaxseed given to each mouse was 5% of its total food intake, which would be a very difficult amount for humans to eat, but it does signal that we are on the right track and need to continue research in this area."
This is the Duke group's third study to show the benefits of flaxseed in reducing the growth and development of prostate cancer.
The first, published last year, was a small study showing that men who ate ground flaxseed for 34 days had a drop in levels of testosterone, which helps prostate cancers grow, and in prostate specific antigen (PSA) levels, a marker for prostate cancer.
The second study showed that lignans from flaxseed inhibited the growth of three distinct human prostate cancer cell lines by affecting hormonally driven mechanisms.
Before any conclusions can be made about flaxseed as a cancer preventive, there must be clinical trials, says Demark-Wahnefried. "Our results are encouraging. However, before we can truly state that flaxseed is beneficial in humans, larger well-controlled trials are needed."
An National Cancer Institute-funded clinical trial is currently under way at Duke to test whether a low-fat diet, flaxseed supplements, or a combination of the two is most effective in stopping prostate cancer cells from dividing.
The Department of Agriculture's review of the food guide pyramid was centre stage at the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) Annual Meeting when experts looked at what a new food pyramid could mean for the food industry.
One expert speaking at the forum, Dr Louise Berner from California Polytechnic State University, highlighted the importance of the pyramid in making sure that meals and snacks are based around the whole foods it advocates. She said this is because of the inherent nutrient density, optimal nutrient ratios and the bioavailability of these foods.
Other speakers noted the importance of the food guide pyramid in teaching nutritional needs to consumers, including children, and the leading role that the food industry plays - via marketing and packaging - in the increasing use of the pyramid.
Proposed changes to the nutritional guidance pyramid are moving towards encouraging people to make choices to suit their own wants and needs.
The pyramid was first developed in 1992, but the Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion (CNPP) has concluded that with the rapid increase in overweight and obesity, a "one-size fits all" approach no long works. To improve food choices, individuals need to have access to information specific to their own energy and nutrient needs, based on their age, sex, and physical activity level.
For example, the current food pyramid simply recommends six to 11 daily servings of bread, cereal, rice and pasta. It doesn't specify that these six servings are recommended only for sedentary women and some older adults, while the 11 servings are recommended for teenage boys, many active men and some very active women.
Moreover, although 80 percent of US citizens recognise the food pyramid, two-thirds of them are overweight or obese, suggesting a different educational approach is needed to stem the country's food-related health problems.
Food manufacturers should think twice before jumping on the low-carb band-wagon, as an increasing number of reports suggest that this fad is slowly running out of favour with consumers. A survey published by the Harman Group in the US found that Americans find low-carb diets twice as difficult to stick to as all other diets.
The study found that only 14 per cent of low-carb dieters actually quit the diet because they had reached their weight loss goal, compared to 29 per cent of all weight loss dieters.
This discrepancy was explained by the relative difficulty of keeping to a low-carb diet. Fifty-two percent of those who quit a low-carb diet did so because "it was too hard to maintain", while only 26 percent of people on other diets quit because they had had enough.
Harvey Hartman, founder, chairman and CEO of the Hartman Group, said their research has shown repeatedly that true marketplace change is "consumer driven".
"It is imperative that the food and beverage industry understand the true consumer behaviour underlying the hype that so often accompanies consumer trends," he said.
Eating plenty of legumes - such as lima beans, kidney beans and black-eyed peas - can reduce your risk of heart disease and stroke, and even help prevent cancer.
Duke University Medical Centre in the US says the beans that come packed with these benefits are the starchy legumes: green peas, navy beans, lima beans, black-eyed peas, kidney beans, and more exotic varieties like garbanzos, black beans, lentils, and fava beans.
Despite their differences in colour and taste, all the legumes have similar nutritional value. A serving (one third of a cup of cooked beans) contains around 80 calories, no cholesterol, lots of complex carbohydrates, and little fat. In addition, beans are a good source of B vitamins, potassium, and fibre, which promotes digestive health, relieves constipation, and may even help prevent colon cancer and reduce blood cholesterol (a leading cause of heart disease).
They say legumes make a good side dish and can also be used as a substitute for meat. While legumes don't contain complete proteins such as meat, you could supplement your diet by eating grain or dairy products along with legumes.
A US cancer prevention expert says that, if government required calcium and vitamin D to be added to cereal grain products, there would be a 20 per cent reduction in colon cancer deaths and osteoporosis-related fractures. Dr Harold Newmark is calling on the US Food and Drug Administration to add calcium and vitamin D to the existing FDA-mandated enrichment mix in products such as bread and pasta. He contends the measure could save 11,000 lives and an estimated $3 billion in US health care costs annually.
In an article appearing in the August 1 issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Dr Newmark and his colleagues at Rutgers University propose these nutrients be added to the current enrichment program for cereal-grain products.
In the AJCN article, the researchers said: "The benefits would be a significant reduction in the incidences of osteoporosis and colon cancer over time and an overall improvement in health at a modest financial cost and with minor modification of existing technology".
Their requests are based on the widely understood role of calcium in bone health and growing knowledge of its effect in the colon. In the presence of high-fat diets - increasingly common in the developed world - calcium helps inactivate the resulting fatty acids in the colon that produce irritation, cell damage and other effects that can lead to cancer. Vitamin D aids in the absorption of dietary calcium by the body.
For decades, researchers have recognised the role of calcium in reducing the risk of diseases such as osteoporosis and colon cancer. This has not, however, been reflected in US federal regulations, according to the researchers.
US Department of Agriculture surveys cited in the paper show that Americans consume inadequate dietary calcium and vitamin D - far below the recommended levels established by the Food Nutrition Board, Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.
The US requires the enrichment of certain cereal-derived food products with vitamins and minerals such as thiamine, riboflavin, niacin and iron, but calcium and vitamin D are optional and consequently ignored by producers, the authors contend.
"For about 10 cents per person per year, we can use existing technology to correct all this," Dr Newmark said in the journal article. "We believe that the time has come for a full scientific review of cereal-grain enrichment with calcium and vitamin D as a low-cost, safe and useful route for the reduction of osteoporosis and colon cancer in the United States in both men and women."
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