A recent
review carried out by a select group of experts at the mandate of the US News
and World report publication did come out to say that when it comes to diabetes
management and prevention, two diets came out joint tops. These are The Biggest
Loser Diet and the DASH diet.
When it
comes to the best overall diet however, the DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop
Hypertension) diet tops the list with 4.1 stars out of a possible 5. The TLC
diet or Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes diet, a diet plan created by the National
Institutes of Health came second with 4 stars out of five, while the Mayo
Clinics, the Mediterranean and Weight Watchers diet were placed joint third
with 3.9 stars each out of the possible 5. So where is the Paleolithic diet to
be found in all this? Do you even know what the Paleolithic diet is?
Well, the
Paleo diet represents modern man's attempt to get back to the diet of his
ancestors based on the premise that these while living on such a diet did not
experience many of the modern-day diseases that we are experiencing today.
Diseases like high blood pressure, stroke, diabetes, heart disease and the
like. This luck has been put down to their diet and the expectation is that if
we want to reverse some of these conditions or at the very least live a
healthier lifestyle, then we too must adopt such diet.
This diet
would essentially have been made of lean meat, nuts, seeds and berries. It is
also known as the Paleolithic or caveman diet
Interestingly,
several studies actually show that the Paleolithic diet has greater positive
effects for diabetics over other diets. One instance is a 2007 study by
Lindeberg on 29 diabetic patients with either glucose intolerance or type two
diabetes.
In that
study these individuals were divided into two groups and placed on either a
Mediterranean or Paleolithic diet.
The
results of that study showed that although there was a marked improvement in
glucose tolerance in both groups, the improvement was far greater in the group
on the Paleolithic diet. So it actually comes as a surprise to find the
Paleolithic diet coming in last at 34 in the study carried out by US News and
World report. Is the Paleolithic diet the best diet for diabetics then?
Certainly not.
However
having said this and to be fair to the diet, it must be noted that other
parameters were used in judging just how effective the diet is. These are;
Short-term weight Loss, Long-term weight loss, Ease of being followed,
Nutrition, Safety, Diabetes and Heart health. The diet only got two stars for
short-term weight loss, 1.7 stars for long-term weight loss, 1.7 stars again
for ease of being followed, 2 for nutrition, 2.3 for safety, 2.1 for diabetes and
2 for heart health. It therefore scored 2 overall.
On the
other hand the Dukan diet which also got the same 2 stars for Diabetes
parameters out performs it overall showing that diet may not be as bad in
diabetes department but what led to its downfall is its performance in the
other parameters of assessment.
Funnily enough, the Mediterranean diet which
other studies show the Paleolithic diet as besting, actually scores better than
it according to this review with 3.4 out of 5 stars for diabetes. Maybe
something is not quite right here.
Further
it might be said that the review initiated at the behest of US News and World
report is only one review and we should wait for others before drawing the
final conclusions on it as it relates to its Diabetic effects.
Nevertheless
if we are to go by that review alone, for now the Paleolithic diet is not only
not the best diet for diabetics but quite likely one of the least effective for
the condition and possibly the worst diet of the 35 overall. In fact one of the
experts proclaimed that, this diet should go back to where it came from.
No comments:
Post a Comment