Recently, I was asked whether I knew of any nutritional studies that helped to demonstrate that the Paleo Diet is good for your health. So rather than your normal weekly links post, here is a special, one-off Paleo Diet links post.
General introductory articles
- Biological and clinical potential of a paleolithic diet – the conclusion of this study is that “a paleolithic diet based on lean meat, fish, vegetables and fruit may be effective in the prevention and treatment of common Western diseases.”
- Origins and evolution of the Western diet: health implications for the 21st century – this is a great study for breaking down the implications of switching diets: “the novel foods (dairy products, cereals, refined cereals, refined sugars, refined vegetable oils, fatty meats, salt, and combinations of these foods) introduced as staples during the Neolithic and Industrial Eras fundamentally altered several key nutritional characteristics of ancestral hominin diets and ultimately had far-reaching effects on health and well-being.”
- Human nutrition and food research: opportunities and challenges in the post-genomic era – this nicely accessible article discusses various human populations and how their incidence of various diseases increased as their diets changed.
- Stone agers in the fast lane: chronic degenerative diseases in evolutionary perspective - this article summarises the lifestyle of hunter-gatherers, summarises our lifestyle and then analyses the impact of the various differences and relates these to the common Western diseases of civilisation.
- The Ancestral Biomedical Environment – this article goes into some detail about the dietary practices of hunter-gatherers and how that can be analysed nutritionally.
- Said another way: stroke, evolution, and the rainforests: an ancient approach to modern health care - this study explores the principles of the study of the Paleo Diet, noting that “the selective forces that resulted in the evolution of the human species were mainly environmental. Our metabolism, physiology, and genome, therefore, are geared towards survival under certain environmental parameters.”
Obesity
- Is the relatively low intake of omega-3 fatty acids in Western diet contributing to the obesity epidemics? – this study looks at one aspect of the Paleo Diet that is different from the modern Western Diet, that of the ratio of Omega 3 and Omega 6 fats. It says “alongside the increase of obesity in the world there is the avoidance of saturated fat and an increased dietary use of vegetable oils rich in omega-6 fatty acids. These changes result in a marked increase of the omega-6/omega-3 ratio and there is increasing evidence that this changed balance is related to lifestyle diseases.”
- Obesity, waist-hip ratio and hunter-gatherers - if you ever wondered what would happen if you put a hunter-gatherer onto a Western diet, this study will satisfy your curiosity. Apparently, “such people are intolerant of carbohydrate, especially refined carbohydrate, especially in the excessive amounts typically consumed in affluent societies. In such pure hunter-gatherer communities, rates of diabetes can be as high as 50%, when the Western lifestyle is adopted.”
Cardiovascular disease
- Coronary Artery Disease Prognosis and C-Reactive Protein Levels Improve in Proportion to Percent Lowering of Low-Density Lipoprotein - according to this study, “the physiologically normal cholesterol range is approximately 30 to 70 mg/dl for native hunter-gatherers, healthy human neonates, free-living primates, and virtually all wild mammals.” I guess we are the odd ones out, then.
- The atherogenic potential of dietary carbohydrate – this is interesting, depending on your view of the importance of carbohydrate in the Paleo Diet (pace Matt Metzgar), as it notes that “high-carbohydrate diets, particularly in the form of high-glycemic index carbohydrate, have the ability to directly induce atherosclerosis. Based on anthropologic facts, the reason for these dietary-induced, insulin-mediated, atherogenic metabolic perturbations are suggested to be an insufficient adaptation to starch and sugars during human evolution.” I wonder whether you could duplicate the effects of this study by eating boat-loads of fruit or whether that would produce a different result…
- The Kitava Study – interestingly, that might be exactly what the Kitava study shows. Kitavans were found to be largely free of heart disease eating a hunter gatherer diet that was about 60% carbs from tubers. They started developing cardiovascular disease with the introduction of grains. Their total carbohydrate intake did not change but the source did.
Type 2 diabetes
- A Paleolithic diet confers higher insulin sensitivity, lower C-reactive protein and lower blood pressure than a cereal-based diet in domestic pigs - this study found that “a Paleolithic diet conferred higher insulin sensitivity, lower C-reactive protein and lower blood pressure when compared to a cereal based diet.”
- The original human diet is good for people with diabetes - in this clinical study, fourteen patients who were advised to consume a Paleo Diet for three months were compared with fifteen patients who were recommended to follow a Mediterranean-like diet including whole-grain cereals, low-fat dairy products, fruit, vegetables and refined fats. All patients demonstrated glucose intolerance prior to the study and most of them had type two diabetes. In addition, all had been diagnosed with coronary heart disease. The main result of the trial was that the blood sugar rise in response to carbohydrate intake was markedly lower after twelve weeks in the group following the Paleo Diet, while it barely changed in the Mediterranean group. At the end of the study, all patients in the group following the Paleo Diet had normal blood glucose.
Osteoporosis
- Estimation of the net acid load of the diet of ancestral preagricultural Homo sapiens and their hominid ancestors - the findings of this study suggest that “diet-induced metabolic acidosis in humans eating contemporary diets reflect a mismatch between the nutrient composition of the diet and genetically determined nutritional requirements for optimal systemic acid-base status”. In other words, our diet creates a lot more acidosis than hunter-gatherer diets. This leads to osteoporosis.
- Relationship and Interaction between Sodium and Potassium - according to this study, “compared with the Stone Age diet, the modern human diet is both excessive in sodium chloride and deficient in fruits and vegetables that are rich in potassium ions and carbonate ions.” What are the implications of this reversal? Well, they include hypertension, kidney stones and osteoporosis.
Well, there you go. Do with all that what you will. As for me, I think I deserve a beer. Sorry, my stone age friends, but there are some things that have definitely improved since the dawn of civilisation…
