Search results for "MEDITERRANEAN DIET"

Healthy eating as a strategy to achieve successful ageing: focus on Mediterranean diet and functional foods.

People want to live longer. To date, it is impossible not to grow older, but it is desirable to get older in good health, avoiding age-related disabilities. To do this, it is necessary to have a healthy lifestyle which can limit the damage caused by the environmental hazards that face us each day. In humans, healthy ageing and longevity are modulated by a fortunate interaction between genetic and environmental factors. Regarding the latter, physical activity and healthy dietary habits are the most important modifiable factors that can affect the maintenance of a healthy ageing phenotype. A feasible diet that reduces the risk of ageing-related diseases, promoting health ageing and longevity,…

Slow-Ageing Diets

2019

Ageing is a complex, unavoidable phenomenon than cannot be exhaustively defined. However, it has been described as a process leading to death, characterized by a gradual decrease of the ability to adapt to stress, causing a decline in functional capacity. This event, marked by a progressive loss of physiological integrity of many interrelated systems, determines an increased risk of morbidity and mortality (Avery et al. 2014). With increase of the proportion of older adults worldwide (United Nations 2017), it is necessary to carry out prevention policy for a healthy ageing (HA). Good nutrition plays a significant role in determining the well-being of older people, and in delaying and reduci…

Diet and Immunosenescence

2013

Ageing is a systemic condition leading to a gradual loss of molecular and cellular fidelity. A feature of ageing is immunosenescence, consisting in several modifications that increase morbidity and mortality in elderly. Environment, genetic background, immune system, and intestinal microbiota play a fundamental role in immunosenescence. The development of a chronic, low-grade, inflammatory status, known as “inflamm-ageing,” is a typical aspect of immunosenescence mostly due to the pro-inflammatory cytokine production linked to the chronic antigenic load. Nutrition can act on ageing, immunity, and health in general. Unbalanced diet with an insufficient intake of micro- and macronutrient and …

Similar prediction of the decreased total mortality, diabetes incidence or cardiovascular events using a relative- and an absolute-component Mediterr…

2013

Abstract Background and Aim: Accumulated evidence supports the effectiveness of Mediterranean-type diets (MeDiet) in reducing mortality and preventing several chronic diseases. Widely used scores to assess adherence to MeDiet are based on specific sample characteristics; alternatively, they might be built according to absolute/normative cut-off points for the consumption of specific food groups (pre-defined servings/day or/week). The aim of this study was to compare sample-specific MeDiet adherence scores (MDS) versus absolutenormative scores (Mediterranean Diet Adherence Screener e MEDAS) on their association with macronutrient intake, total mortality and incidence of chronic diseases. Des…

OLIVE OIL CONSUMPTION AND RISK OF CORONARY HEART DISEASE AND/OR STROKE: A META-ANALYSIS OF CASE-CONTROL, COHORT AND INTERVENTION STUDIES

2014

Increasing evidence suggests that the Mediterranean diet can reduce the risk of CVD. Olive oil is the hallmark of this dietary pattern. We conducted a meta-analysis of case–control, prospective cohort studies and a randomised controlled trial investigating the specific association between olive oil consumption and the risk of CHD (101 460 participants) or stroke (38 673 participants). The results of all observational studies were adjusted for total energy intake. The random-effects model assessing CHD as an outcome showed a relative risk (RR) of 0·73 (95% CI 0·44, 1·21) in case–control studies and 0·96 (95% CI 0·78, 1·18) in cohort studies for a 25 g increase in olive oil consumption. In co…

Antiaging Medicine

2009

• The factors best demonstrated to delay aging are fruit and vegetables, exercise, not smoking, drinking one or two glasses of alcohol daily, and fish consumption. • Vitamin D replacement, in persons with low 25[OH] vitamin D levels, decreases hip fractures, improves muscle strength, enhances function, and decreases mortality. • Antiaging medicine has been hijacked by charlatans who promote unproven or dangerous remedies to a naïve aging public. • Too often animal studies that produce longevity are directly applied to humans before appropriate clinical trials have been carried out. • There is no evidence that hormones or megadoses of vitamins prolong life. • Numerous products of varying qua…

LONGEVITY AND THE SECRETS OF CENTENARIANS

2017

Aging of the world populations represents one of the most remarkable success stories of medicine and of humankind. Hence, the search for ways to prolong health expectancy is a primary goal in medicine. Human life expectancy increased extraordinarily during the last century worldwide. Life expectancy at birth has almost doubled in most developed countries over the last century, with the oldest group being the most rapidly growing segment of the population. The number of centenarians in Italy is over 16.000 and the number is over tripled in few years (they were 5.000 in 2001). Among older population, centenarians may be considered the best example of successful aging. The capacity to avoid, d…

ADHERENCE TO A MEDITERRANEAN DIET AND PHYSICAL FUNCTION DECLINE AMONG OLDER PERSONS

2011

The mediterranean diet: A history of health

2013

The Mediterranean tradition offers a cousine rich in colors, aromas and memories, which support the taste and the spirit of those who live in harmony with nature. Everyone is talking about the Mediterranean diet, but few are those who do it properly, thus generating a lot of confusion in the reader. And so for some it coincides with the pizza, others identified it with the noodles with meat sauce, in a mixture of pseudo historical traditions and folklore that do not help to solve the question that is at the basis of any diet: combine and balance the food so as to satisfy the qualitative and quantitative needs of an individual and in a sense, preserves his health through the use of substance…

Short and middle term effects of hypocaloric low carbohydrate diet vs hypocaloric Mediterranean diet on endothelial function in obese subjects

2008

Adequate nutritional treatment is required to address the problem of increasing prevalence of obesity in Western countries. The Mediterranean diet style is now acknowledged to have large scientific evidences in terms of cardiovascular prevention. However, many popular diets are diffusing also as self-prescribed treatments. Among those, the efficacy of low-carbohydrate diets (also known as Atkins’ diet in its most popular variety) has been addressed by some investigations. It is generally concluded that the low-carbohydrate diet is able to induce a greater weight loss, at least in the middle term, and a better serum lipid profile than the conventional diet. In this longitudinal, randomised, …