NutritionFacts.org Video Podcast

Lifestyle changes are often more effective in reducing the rates of heart disease, hypertension, heart failure, stroke, cancer, diabetes, and premature death than almost any other medical intervention.

What happened when the World Health Organization had the gall to recommend a diet low in saturated fat, sugar, and salt and high in fruit and vegetables?

Saturated fat can be toxic to the insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas, explaining why animal fat consumption can impair insulin secretion, not just insulin sensitivity.

Bariatric weight-loss surgery (like Roux-en-Y gastric bypass) is increasingly performed in children as young as five years old.

Straining at stool over time may force part of the stomach up into the chest, contributing to GERD acid reflux disease. This may explain why hiatal hernia is extremely rare among populations eating high-fiber diets.

Music can beat out anti-anxiety drugs, Mozart can reduce allergic reactions, and how listening to your favorite tunes can significantly affect your testosterone levels.

The first-line treatment for hypertension is lifestyle modification, which often includes the DASH diet. What is it and how can it be improved?

Even though modern African diets may now be as miserably low in fiber as American diets, Africans still appear to have 50 times less colorectal cancer than Americans (our second leading cancer killer).

Decreasing animal protein and sodium intake appears more effective in treating calcium oxalate and uric acid kidney stones (nephrolithiasis) than restricting calcium or oxalates.

An eighth teaspoon of powdered ginger was found to work as well as the migraine headache drug sumatriptan (Imitrex) without the side effects.

Gnathostomiasis from raw fish is a growing problem, manifested by tiny worms that burrow under our skin and, in rare cases, can get into our eyes and brain.

Heme iron, the type found predominantly in blood and muscle, is absorbed better than the non-heme iron that predominates in plants, but may increase the risk of cancer, stroke, heart disease, and metabolic syndrome.

Immunocompromised patients, such as those undergoing chemotherapy, are often denied fresh fruits and vegetables to ostensibly protect them against foodborne illness.

What might happen if nutritional excellence were taught in medical school?

A quick, non-invasive, and inexpensive test for the early detection of Alzheimer’s disease is developed using only a ruler and some peanut butter.