Dietary patterns are modifiable risk factors for chronic diseases, including cardiovascular disease and malignancies.
Dietary patterns are linked to chronic disease risk factors including: lipids, diabetes, hypertension, BMI, atherosclerosis and inflammation.
When sugars are added to foods and beverages, they add calories but do not contribute essential nutrients.
It is recommended to limit added sugars to less than 10% of calories per day to achieve healthy eating patterns.
Added sugars currently account for more than 13% of total calories consumed by the US population.
The recommendation that we eat three meals a day with some snacking on top is mainly based on studies of diabetics, but it intermittent fasting actually improves glucose regulation.
The epidemic of obesity has occurred occurred in the past 40 years with the eating pattern of three meals a day plus snacks.
Saturated fats should be Limited to less than 10% of calories per day.
Replacing saturated fats with polyunsaturated fats is associated with a reduced risk of cardiovascular disease events and deaths.
The average sodium intake among Americans is currently 3440 mg per day and should be reduced.
The Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) originally designed to reduce hypertension, has been shown to reduce overall mortality in adults with hypertension and women with heart failure over approximately 5 to 8 years of follow-up.
DASH diet is associated with approximately 17% decrease in the risk for all-cause and cardiovascular disease mortality in the adults age more than 60 years.
Healthy eating dietary guidelines limit sodium to less than 2300 mg per day for adults and children age 14 years or older.
There is a linear response relationship between increased sodium intake and increased blood pressure in adults, but the direct evidence for the association between sodium intake and risk of cardiovascular disease in adults is not as consistent as the evidence for blood pressure.
Healthy eating patterns include: vegetables from all the subgroups-dark green, red and orange, lagoons, storage unit, and other fruits especially whole fruits, grains at least half of which are whole grains, fat free or low fat dairy, including milk, yogurt, cheese, and fortified soy beverages, protein foods including seafood, lean meats, poultry, eggs, beans and cheese, nuts, seeds, and soy products, and oils.
Alcohol should be consumed in moderation up to one drink per day for women and it up to two drinks per day for men and only in adults of legal drinking age.
Meta-analyses of randomized, controlled trials that included adults of at least 18 years of age; identified particular dietary patterns; measured outcomes such as body mass index (BMI); cholesterol scores; glucose, insulin, or HbA1c scores; or blood pressures.
The 80 studies included low-carbohydrate diets, high-protein diets, the paleolithic diet, vegetarian diets, low-fat diets, the Mediterranean diet, the DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) diet, the Nordic diet, and low-glycemic-index or low-glycemic-load diets.
For all the diets included, however, the Mediterranean diet was the only diet that demonstrated significant and beneficial effects for all the parameters analyzed from body weight, blood pressures, cholesterol scores, and glycemic scores. without evidence of potential adverse effects.