Once again, I’m reflecting on the research around “diets.” First of all, I hate the word diet. It involves some kind of rigorous eating plan that, once completed, will solve all your health problems and somehow miraculously allow you to resume old habits. Or it refers to something that goes up and down a couple of times a year in the hope of avoiding weight gain.
Diet is actually defined as the foods that a person or animal usually eats. In that sense, the way we use the diet is totally wrong. For most, “diets” have a predictable end, while a diet is actually the way you eat most of the time.
There are numerous “diets” or ways of eating that are being advertised. Who hasn’t heard of the ketogenic diet by now? There are also paleo, Mediterranean, low carb, macrobiotic, vegetarian, vegan, etc. All these all his plan is the “way” everyone should eat. It can be extremely confusing. It’s like choose your own dieting adventure.
Naturally, as a dietitian, everyone wants to know what I consider to be the BEST diet. Some are disappointed when I don’t give a clear and firm answer about it. You see, the reason I keep pondering several of these diets is because I have seen through countless client encounters that many diets, however healthy they may seem, it just doesn’t work for some people. I’ve had people come in, desperate for help, because the “healthy” diet they’ve followed to the letter doesn’t produce weight loss results, or worse, causes increased lipid levels and decreased energy. . What gives?
Recent Texas A&M research may provide some useful results.1 They showed that in mice fed various popular diets (Standard American, Ketogenic, Japanese, Atkins, etc.), they all responded differently, some positive and some negative. In other words, some mice showed positive improvements on particular plans, while others worsened on the same diet.
The key is genetics. The researchers in this study suspect that genetic variations make our bodies respond better or worse to various foods and eating styles. For example, one particular mouse did very poorly on the Japanese diet, surprisingly, while the rest remained in good health. Also, most did poorly on the standard American diet (as expected), but some did less poorly than others.
The take-home message is that clearly one diet does not fit all. A diet that improves the health of one person may worsen the health of another. Many people want to promote and sell the universal “ideal” diet, and yet it is becoming increasingly clear that it does not exist. The role of genetics will only continue to become more prominent as we search for answers in the obesity epidemic and for conditions like heart disease, diabetes, and hypertension.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/11/171130170236.htm
