Diet and nutrition Archive

Hamburgers, fries, sugary sodas, and other less healthy foods may cause inflammation, a key player in the formation of artery-clogging plaque.

Eating foods such as red meat and sugary treats may trigger inflammation, raising your risk of cardiovascular disease. But a diet rich in fruits, vegetables, and other anti-inflammatory foods reduces the risk, according to a large Harvard study.

"These new findings help explain why certain foods we consider unhealthy may be contributing to plaque buildup inside arteries," says Dr. Kathryn Rexrode, associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a co-author of the study, published last year in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Inflammation is marked by the release of molecules called cytokines into the bloodstream. These attract immune cells to artery walls, contributing to the development of plaque, she explains.

Losing weight sometimes takes experimentation. If you give a diet your best shot and it doesn't work long term, maybe it wasn't the right one for you, your metabolism, or your situation. Genes, family, your environment — even your friends — influence how, why, what, and how much you eat, so don't get too discouraged or beat yourself up because a diet that "worked for everybody" didn't pay off for you. Try another, keeping in mind that almost any diet will help you shed pounds — at least for a short time.

Here's a look at three common diet approaches.

Stress eating can ruin your weight loss goals – the key is to find ways to relieve stress without overeating

There is much truth behind the phrase "stress eating." Stress, the hormones it unleashes, and the effects of high-fat, sugary "comfort foods" push people toward overeating. Researchers have linked weight gain to stress, and according to an American Psychological Association survey, about one-fourth of Americans rate their stress level as 8 or more on a 10-point scale.

In the short term, stress can shut down appetite. The nervous system sends messages to the adrenal glands atop the kidneys to pump out the hormone epinephrine (also known as adrenaline). Epinephrine helps trigger the body's fight-or-flight response, a revved-up physiological state that temporarily puts eating on hold.

Here's what the research says about diet and depression.

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If you've ever found yourself in front of the TV after a bad day, mindlessly digging ice cream out of the container with a spoon, you know that mood and food are sometimes linked. But while stress eating is a verified phenomenon, the relationship between food and actual mood disorders, such as depression, is less clear. Or, to put it another way: can the things you eat influence your risk for depression — and can dietary changes potentially improve your mental health?

"The research regarding dietary factors and depression is still inconclusive," says Patricia Chocano-Bedoya, a visiting scientist in the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. But there have been hints that food may play a role in depression.

The foods you eat (and don't) can determine how well your body fights painful inflammation.

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It's been said that you are what you eat, and that's definitely true when it comes to chronic pain.

"A lot of chronic pain is the result of chronic inflammation, and the evidence is quite strong that your diet can contribute to increased systemic inflammation," says Dr. Fred Tabung, a visiting researcher with the Department of Nutrition at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health. "But your diet is also one of the best ways to reduce it."

Make sure your diet meets the recommended mineral targets.

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Gold, silver, and platinum get all the attention as the world's most precious metals. But they're more precious for the global economy than for human health. Instead, other metals and minerals (metals are one type of mineral) are more important for our health (see "What essential metals do for us"). Indeed, some of them are so important that we can't live without them. "Each one plays a role in hundreds of body functions. It may take just a very small quantity of a particular mineral, but having too much or too little can upset a delicate balance in the body," says Dr. Bruce Bistrian, chief of clinical nutrition at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

They're packed with nutrients but high in starchy carbohydrates.

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Root vegetables — like turnips, rutabagas, and parsnips — may not be the sexiest foods on the table. But they're big celebrities in a number of cuisine trends like the "vegetable forward" movement (which elevates vegetables into creative entrees and side dishes) and root-to-stem cooking (which uses every part of a vegetable, including the tops, stems, and skins).

While it's fun to use old standbys in more interesting ways (like roasted parsnips with pistachio and lemon), it's important to eat root vegetables judiciously. "They are so high in carbohydrates that they are more like grains than greens. It makes more sense to put them in the same category as breads, rice, or pasta," says dietitian Teresa Fung, adjunct professor in the nutrition department at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Most older adults take some kind of over-the-counter dietary supplement. But are these products right for everyone?

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Over-the-counter dietary supplements are big business — more than 90,000 products generate about $30 billion every year in the United States. Older adults make up a big part of these sales, too. A survey of almost 3,500 adults ages 60 and older published Oct. 1, 2017, in The Journal of Nutrition found that 70% use a daily supplement (either a multivitamin or individual vitamin or mineral), 54% take one or two supplements, and 29% take four or more.

But are these pills good medicine, or a waste of money?

Experts say there's little evidence that low-dose aspirin therapy brings benefits, and there are some risks.

In recent years, there's been a lot of talk about the potential benefits, and risks, of a regular regimen of low-dose aspirin. While much of the discussion has centered on whether taking low-dose aspirin can head off cardiovascular disease, some of the focus has also been on breast cancer. Can regular doses of this over-the-counter pain reliever reduce your risk of this common cancer?

For a while there were hints that the evidence was leaning that way. Back in 2017, this area of research, while still inconclusive, was somewhat promising. For example, a 2017 study published in Breast Cancer Research found that among some 57,000 women, those who reported taking low-dose aspirin (81 mg) at least three times a week had a 16% lower risk of breast cancer over all and a 20% lower risk of a specific type of hormonally driven breast cancer.

News briefs

A Mediterranean-style diet is rich in vegetables, legumes, fruits, whole grains, nuts, seeds, poultry, fish, and olive oil, and it's associated with lower risks for heart disease and diabetes. And a "greener" version of the eating style might be even more effective, according to a small, randomized study published online Nov. 23, 2020, by the journal Heart. Researchers — some from Harvard — recruited about 300 sedentary, middle-aged people (mostly men) with high cholesterol or abdominal obesity and divided them into three groups. One received guidance for exercise and a healthy diet; another received exercise guidance and was assigned to eat a calorie-restricted Mediterranean diet; and one group received exercise guidance and was assigned to eat a "greener" calorie-restricted Mediterranean diet with less animal-based and more plant-based proteins (including walnuts and a type of duckweed — an aquatic plant), plus lots of green tea. After six months, people on the "green" diet had lost more weight and inches around their middles, and had bigger drops in cholesterol, than people in the other two groups. "Green" dieters also had steeper declines in insulin resistance, inflammation markers, and diastolic blood pressure (the lower number in the measurement), compared with the other two groups.

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