Preventing Cancer and Diabetes with a Mediterranean Diet

One of the fastest growing trends in dieting is the so-called Mediterranean diet. This formula for healthier nutrition has been said to have amazing benefits, including cancer prevention and diabetes control. If you’re interested in learning more about this diet plan, you’ll find useful information below.

What is Mediterranean Diet?


If you want to follow the Mediterranean diet plan for nutrition, you’ll need to change a few of your eating habits. For example, you’ll probably need to consume larger quantities of fruits and vegetables, as well as fish. At the same time, you’ll need to lower down your consumption of red meat and get additional protein from small portions of nuts. Drinking red wine and adding more healthy oils, such as canola and olive oils, to your diet are also important.

Benefits of the Diet

According to the Mayo Clinic, a study released in 2007 found that people who followed the diet outlined above had much lower risks of cancer and heart disease than did people who followed a more Western diet. Additionally, the University of Maryland Medical Center reports that choosing to follow this lifestyle change has a number of powerful benefits for people with diabetes, especially because it is lower in sugar and carbohydrates which can cause spikes in blood sugar levels.

Reasons to Switch

If don’t want to go through the stress and negative effects of cancer treatment in your lifetime, changing to eat more of these Mediterranean foods could be a smart idea. After all, many of the known cancer causes do relate to improper nutrition. Plus, if you want to have a healthy immune system to fight back against abnormal cells you’ll need adequate nutrition that you won’t find in your average fast food meal. Most of the foods included, such as the heart healthy oils, will do double or triple duty protecting you from chronic disease.

Know Your Best Diet Plan for Weight Loss in Right Way

For those trying to loose weight, choosing from the numerous weight loss programs can be quite a daunting task. The best solution to this problem is to decide not on a diet but a nutritional change of life. Dieting for a month or a year will not help if you return to old eating habits. Instead try and choose a diet that can be a consistent way of eating for years to come.

Know about some diet plans below and choose the best for you:

Atkins

The Atkins diet focuses on a high protein low carbohydrate diet. Because carbohydrates are used for energy, eliminating their intake forces the body to use fat stores. If breads, rice, and potatoes favorites then this might not be the right lifestyle choice.

South Beach

The South Beach diet also restricts carbohydrates. The South Beach diet does not allow consumption of bad fats. In addition this diet does not strictly count carbohydrates and allows carbs with a low glycemic index.

The Zone Diet

The Zone Diet plan is based on eating the correct combination of foods, 30% protein, 30% fat and 40% carbohydrates. For those who can enjoy the bad foods in extreme moderation this way of eating might work well.

Mediterranean Diet

The Mediterranean Diet focuses more on keeping the heart healthy than losing weight. It focuses on eating a lot of vegetables and fruits and some nuts and wine and using good oils for cooking. Fish is encouraged while red meat is discouraged. Keep in mind weight loss will be slow.

Macrobiotic Diet

This diet is low fat, high fiber and is mostly vegetarian. In this meal plan whole grains make up about 50% of each meal. Vegetables make up about 30% and beans make up about 10% of the diet. Fish is allowed in very small amounts and meat, poultry and eggs are not permitted. This is a very restrictive diet and might not be a good lifestyle choice.

Gluten Free

A Gluten Free diet is mostly for those allergic to wheat. It avoids all foods containing gluten or from gluten cereals like wheat, rye or barley. In addition this does not promote weight loss.

Detox Diets

Most detox diets are liquid diets whose purpose is to rid the body of harmful chemicals and toxins. There are some special formulated liquids to aid in this type of diet and some people just drink hot water with lemon for a few days and consume nothing else. Obviously there is weight loss but this is not a long term nutritional plan.

While choosing a new nutritional lifestyle is advantageous to weight and health, good fitness programs should also be included. Aerobic activity and weight trains should be included in a fitness routine.

Never opt for a fad dieting.