A new study, which has monitored more than 100,000 people over decades, shows that the risk of early death from any cause can be reduced by almost 20 percent, just by eating a variety of healthy foods.
References studying Published in JAMA Internal Medicine, Monday, people who carefully followed one of four healthy dietary patterns, all of which focus on consuming more whole grains, fruits, vegetables, nuts, and legumes, were less likely to die from diseases such as cancer and heart disease. Vascular, respiratory disease and nervous disorder.
And lifestyle medicine specialist David Katz praises the study, which he did not participate in, saying that it showed that “there is more than one way to eat and derive the associated health benefits,” according to what was reported by CNN.
Study co-author Dr Frank Hu said: “People often get bored with one way of eating, so this study offers good news, which is that we have a great deal of flexibility in terms of building our own healthy diets that can be tailored to individual food preferences. health conditions and cultures.
Long term study
The study followed the eating habits of 75,000 women and more than 44,000 men over a period of 36 years. None of the men and women participating in the study had cardiovascular disease at the start of the study, and very few were smokers. They took out eating questionnaires every four years.
“This is one of the largest and longest studies examining recommended dietary patterns and long-term risks of premature mortality and mortality from major diseases,” said Hu Jintao, professor of nutrition and epidemiology and chair of the Harvard Department of Nutrition, who was involved in the study.
The study team documented the study participants’ common scores for four healthy eating styles, consistent with current dietary guidelines in the United States.
Frank Ho divided healthy eating patterns into two main systems, one of which is the Mediterranean diet, which emphasizes eating fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, legumes, fish, and a high amount of olive oil, as this dietary pattern focuses on healthy fats, especially monounsaturated fats, in addition to to plant foods and moderate alcohol.”
The second is what they called the “healthy vegetarian diet”, which also focuses on eating more plant products, but gives negative points to all animal products as well as alcohol.
Less consumption of meat
The chair of the Harvard Department of Nutrition encourages adoption of the second system, noting at the same time that people who ate a lot of animal products or foods high in processed carbohydrates ended up with the lowest scores for healthy eating.
Hu said the study found a reduced risk of death from some chronic diseases if people improved their diet over time.
He added that the participants who improved the health of their diet by 25 percent might reduce the risk of death from cardiovascular disease by six to 13 percent, and death from cancer by seven to 18 percent, and there was a decrease of up to seven. percent risk of dying from neurological diseases, such as dementia.
He pointed out that “the reduction in deaths from respiratory diseases is much greater, as a healthy diet reduced the risk by 35 to 46 percent.”
and inAlternative Healthy Eating IndexDeveloped by Harvard University, people have a great deal of flexibility in creating their own healthy eating pattern. But the main recommendations are that a person should eat more plant foods, fewer servings of red and processed meat, and consume less added sugar and sodium, regardless. regarding the type of diet he desires.
“It is never too late to adopt healthy eating patterns, and the benefits of a healthy diet can be significant in terms of reducing the total (numbers) of premature deaths and their various causes,” Hu said.
