The Mediterranean diet has been show to be one of the healthiest, with people consuming it having the most healthy lives. The diet is high on vegetables, fruits, grains, fish, and beans.
The Mediterranean diet is known for its protective effects against cardiovascular disease and cancer, but did you know it also has implications with keeping you safe from diabetes and brain disease?
The diabetes relation
A study carried out in Spain followed a group of 418 diabetes-free subjects aged between
55 and 80. The participants were randomly assigned to either a low-fat diet (control group) or one of the two Mediterranean diet groups, one supplemented with 1 L of olive oil per week and the other with 30 g of nuts per day.
The results showed that, after 4 years, diabetes incidence was lower in the groups that consumed the Mediterranean diet in comparison to the group that did not. It looked like this:
- Olive oil group: 10%
- Nuts group: 11%
- Control group: 17.9%
But the benefits of the Mediterranean diet don’t stop there. Another study showed how it is also beneficial to the brain.
Food for your brain
It is known that the Mediterranean diet is also beneficial for the brain. For example, it has been linked to reduced risk of Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease and depression.
Now, new light has been shed into additional benefits of this diet. A recent study, 2017-kind-of-recent, has shown the effect of the Mediterranean diet on the structural change of senior citizens’ brains.
In their findings, the researchers, from Mcgill University in Canada and University of Edinburgh in the UK, show that brain shrinkage is reduced in patients ranging from 73 to 76 years of age. So, get grandma on that diet!
Summary
To sum up, here’s what the Mediterranean diet is good for:
- Reducing your risk of type 2 diabetes
- Protection against cardiovascular disease
- Protection against brain disease and shrinkage
[expand title=”References“]
http://www.neurology.org/content/early/2017/01/04/WNL.0000000000003559
http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/34/1/14?sid=8afb5522-fa6b-4195-8afd-73f014113b23
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