Rainbow Diet
Meta-study confirms Mediterranean Diet prevents and controls diabetes
Adopting a colourful Mediterranean diet (a Rainbow Diet) helps prevent and even reverse type-2 diabetes, and also improves glycaemic control and cardiovascular risk in persons with established diabetes, according to a 2009 meta-analysis.
A Rainbow Diet can prevent and even reverse early type-2 diabetes
Over the seventeen studies used in the meta-analysis(1), two large prospective studies report a substantially lower risk (83% and 35%, respectively) of ongoing type-2 diabetes in healthy people or in early diagnosed patients, if those people adopt the highest adherence to a colourful Mediterranean diet (a Rainbow Diet). Five randomised, controlled trials showed improvement of fasting glucose and HbA1c levels while not one study reported a worsening of glycemic control with a Mediterranean diet.
Two controlled trials in a secondary prevention setting demonstrated that diabetic patients also received cardiovascular benefits from a Mediterranean diet.
The researchers led by Katherine Esposito in the 2010 report from the University of Naples concluded, “The evidence so far accumulated suggests that adopting a Mediterranean diet may help prevent type 2 diabetes, and also improve glycaemic control and cardiovascular risk in persons with established diabetes”.
In another 2009 study(2), a low carbohydrate Mediterranean Diet was found to improve cardiovascular risk factors and diabetes control amongst overweight patients with type-2 diabetes
Refs:
2. Elhayany, Lustman et al; 22 Sept, 2009
