Nutrition reviews
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Mensink and Katan showed in 1990 that trans fats reduce high- and increase low-density lipoprotein cholesterol. Unilever aided this study because the company considered knowledge on trans fats incomplete in spite of their long history of safe use. ⋯ Over the next 14 years, manufacturers worldwide followed suit. This experience illustrates that food companies need to know about the health effects of their products and how to apply that knowledge.
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Review
The FOOD Trial Collaboration: nutritional supplementation strategies and acute stroke outcome.
Results from three large, randomized, multicenter FOOD (Feed or Ordinary Food) Collaboration Trials showed no reduction in death or poor outcome with routine oral protein-energy supplementation of stroke patients who were primarily well nourished upon admission to the hospital. Nasogastric tube feeding was favored over percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy as the early route of feeding in dysphagic stroke patients.
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Four mechanisms were reviewed to explain the possible association between sweetened beverages and increased overweight or obesity: excess caloric intake, glycemic index and glycemic load, lack of effect of liquid calories on satiety, and displacement of milk. The findings were inconsistent across studies. The strongest support was for the excess caloric intake hypothesis, but the findings were not conclusive. Assigning possible links between sweetened beverage consumption and adiposity requires research that compares and contrasts specific mechanisms, especially in populations at risk for obesity, while controlling for likely confounding variables.
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The increasing global health problems of overweight and obesity are associated with coronary heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, osteoarthritis, and certain cancers, among other health concerns. Vegetarian diets are associated with reduced body weight, lower incidence of certain chronic disease, and lower medical costs compared with non-vegetarian diets. We reviewed the literature to ascertain the extent to which and by what mechanism(s) a plant-based diet may mediate body weight.