Comments on: Do monounsaturated fat-rich diets prevent diabetes?

By: diabetes prevention foods

diabetes prevention foods — Mon, 08 Oct 2012 12:54:40 +0000

Diabetes is a common problem with aging people. It’s the number one killer disease in the world and currently affecting most of the populations in the United States. Alarming numbers only gives us an idea that we should be conscious on what we eat. By the way, milk,cinnamon,coffee and nuts are some powerful diabetes prevention foods.

By: Bill Shrapnel

Bill Shrapnel — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 21:54:28 +0000

Hello Reijo. The current study was relatively small – conducted at just one centre. Maybe people are taking a wait-and-see attitude until the major findings are released. If the PREDIMED study proves mono-rich diets are protective against coronary heart disease I am sure we will hear a lot more about it. Regards, Bill

By: Bill Shrapnel

Bill Shrapnel — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 21:53:54 +0000

Hi Jenna. Cultural appropriateness is an interesting issue. In the PREDIMED study the researchers had some difficulty getting the control subjects to stick to a low fat diet!
For all of us who provide dietary advice, the culture of the individual or group concerned needs to be the platform on which we build our advice – it’s fundamental to adherence.
On the other hand, I think we need to be careful not to assume that a culturally appropriate diet is necessarily a healthy diet. For example, rice-based diets worked well for Asian populations when they were relatively poor, lean and physically active, but these diets don’t look so good now that the populations are increasingly wealthy, overweight, inactive and insulin resistant. Regards, Bill

By: Reijo Laatikainen

Reijo Laatikainen — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 05:55:06 +0000

This is very interesting study and there’s even more to come as you write. Given the results I’m really amazed that this study has not created more hype or debate. Actually, I’m quite disappointed that leading experts have not pondered the results in public. This study was different from the Finnish and other diabetes prevention studies in that there was not any exercise and weight loss intervention. Weight loss or physical exercise as such have been proved to be effective in the prevention of T2D.

By: Jenna

Jenna — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 03:53:04 +0000

Thanks for the article Bill. Just wondering if you have any thoughts on the fact that the study used a culturally appropriate diet (i.e. Mediterranean diet for Spanish people) which was beneficial to health. I’m no expert, but I feel like we are looking at benefits of various ‘traditional’ diets, such as bush foods for Aboriginal people, Okinawan diet for Okinawans, and fish-rice-vegetable based diets for South-East Asian people. Of course there are great similarities between all of these (low in processed foods, high in nutrient dense items), but there are also differences. I wonder if the fact that the diet is culturally important to the people who are eating is making a difference?