Mediterranean Style Diet.
What are the benefits of the Mediterranean Style Diet and what do you eat to follow it?
The Mediterranean Diet is a traditional way of eating among people living in areas around the Mediterranean Sea particularly in Greece, Crete and southern Italy.
The diet combines relatively large amounts of vegetables, fruit, olive oil, fish, garlic, whole grains, beans, nuts, seeds, bread and potatoes with a relatively low intake of red meat and a moderate consumption of red wine.
Overall, the diet provides a total fat content of 25 – 35 per cent, with an unusually low intake of saturated fat that accounts for 8 per cent or less of energy intake.
Many health benefits are associated or linked to the Mediterranean Diet.
Research suggests that the diet may:
Increase longevity
Reduce the risk of heart disease
Reduce the risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
Individuals can adopt simple changes to their diet if they want to follow a Mediterranean style eating pattern.
Health benefits of the Mediterranean diet
Medical researchers began to follow the Mediterranean Diet when they noted that people living in the areas around the Mediterranean Sea had low risks of developing heart disease, cancer and other diet related illnesses. These people also had one the highest adult life expectancies in the world.
Studies show that following a traditional Mediterranean Diet, taking regular exercise and not smoking can prevent more than 80 per cent of new cases of heart disease, 70 per cent of stroke and 90 per cent of type 2 diabetes.2 The diet may also be associated with a slower onset of cognitive decline, but not of dementia.
In addition, studies discovered that following a Mediterranean Style Diet reduces the activity of genes involved in hardening and furring up of arteries (atherosclerosis). The diet has the effect of:
Limiting production of inflammatory chemicals
Reducing formation of foam cells (scavenger cells overladen with oxidized LDL cholesterol, which get trapped in artery walls)
Reducing formation of abnormal blood clots (thrombosis).
Mediterranean Diet and longevity
Many people following a Mediterranean way of eating tend to live longer than populations following other types of diet. When researchers looked at the results of a number of studies investigating high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, obesity and cancer, they found that individuals who reported eating foods consistent with the Mediterranean Diet were 10 – 20 per cent less likely to die from heart disease, cancer or any other cause over the course of the study.
Mediterranean Diet and heart disease
In the 1994 Lyon Diet Heart Study performed by several French medical research bodies, people who were asked to follow a Mediterranean Style Diet after having had a heart attack were significantly less likely to have a second heart attack than those following a ‘prudent Western type diet’.
In fact, the protective effects were so striking a 70 per cent reduction in all causes of death that the study was terminated after 27 months (rather than the planned 5 years) because it was thought unethical not to advise those in the control group to also follow a Mediterranean way of eating.
The results produced by following a Mediterranean Style Diet do not seem to be related to a significant cholesterol-lowering effect other mechanisms are involved.
One of the most likely beneficial factors is the high intake of omega-3 fatty acids.
A high intake of dietary antioxidants and monounsaturated fat also plays a role.
Mediterranean Diet and type 2 diabetes
The Mediterranean Diet is linked to lowering risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
Researchers therefore tested whether or not this way of eating was of benefit to people who already had diabetes, but had not yet needed glucose lowering medication.
A total of 215 overweight people with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes were advised to follow either a low-fat, calorie restricted diet, or a relatively low-carbohydrate, Mediterranean Style Diet containing less than 50 per cent of calories from carbohydrate.
After four years, 70 per cent of those in the low fat group had needed to start glucose lowering medication, compared with only 44 per cent of those following a Mediterranean Style Diet.
Those assigned to the Mediterranean Style Diet also lost more weight and showed greater improvement in risk factors for heart disease than those on the low fat diet.
How to follow a Mediterranean diet
It is relatively easy to start obtaining the health benefits of the Mediterranean Diet:
Eat more fruit and make sure you have fruit every day.
Eat more vegetables, beans and potatoes.
Eat more fish.
Eat more nuts and seeds.
Choose wholegrain bread and wholegrain cereals.
Use olive oil rather than other cooking or dressing oils.
Eat low to moderate amounts of dairy products and poultry.
Eat less red meat, butter and cream.
Eat eggs four times a week or less.
Consume wine in low to moderate amounts.
At the same time, cut back on other types of food, especially biscuits, cakes, sweets and puddings, which can readily be replaced with fruit.
