When I was initially given the assignment to create a nutrition related blog, I felt uninspired, and unsure. I played with a few ideas and none of them really excited me for the project. I decided on writing about Thinking About Food as Medicine, it was when I realized I needed to start taking my own health a little more seriously.
Since the semester started, I had a very bad cough. This transformed into terrible wheezing, fatigue, and labored breathing. I was prescribed a few different anti-biotics, and was using an inhaler daily for 2 months. I finally saw a specialist in the beginning of November, who stated that there was fluid in my left lobe, probably from tissue damage from Pneumonia. I’m feeling much better now after the trials of antibiotics, and this experience left me with the inspiration for this blog!
As a “sometimes smoker” I told myself I need to start taking my health more serious, Not only do I need to start tailoring my diet to what my body needs, but I must partake in more physical activities and definitely reevaluate the smoking.
Since I was sick of being sick, I decided to focus my discussion on how not to be sick. This also came from inspiration from a book my aunt got me for my birthday last year. This book is titled “How Not to Die” by Michael Greger, M.D. and subtitled “Discover the Food Scientifically Proven to Prevent and Reverse Disease” this book will also be the main topic of my Podcast, to come in the next week.
So, in this post I will take excerpts rom this book to talk about lungs! Lung disease is the #2 Killer in America, after Heart Disease.
Greger states,
“Most of the 160,00 lung cancer deaths each year are direct results of smoking. However, a healthy diet may help mitigate the DNA-damaging effects of tobacco smoke, as well as perhaps help prevent lung cancer from spreading… a diet rich in fruits and vegetables may slow the progression of the disease and improve lung function for its thirteen million sufferers.”
One of the vegetables Greger suggests to load up on to benefit lung function is broccoli. In regards to lung cancer from smoking, he states that broccoli can fight the toxic effect of chemicals within tobacco. He looked at a study done on longtime smokers. The participants were asked to consume 25 times more broccoli than the average American, which is just one stock a day. Compared to broccoli avoiding smokers, the Broccoli eating smokers suffered 41 percent fewer DNA mutations in their bloodstream over 10 days.
“Eating vegetables like broccoli may make you more resilient at a subcelluar level” says Greger. He also states that certain compounds in the vegetable may suppress metastatic spread.
The passage that stuck with me the most from this chapter was the one where he does not bash western medicine and it’s benefits for cancer patients. He simply states that “The nice thing about healthy dietary intervention is that since they have no downsides, they can be added to whatever other treatments one chooses.”
Greger continues this chapter to discuss the benefits of kale and turmeric. He states that turmeric may also prevent some of the DNA damage caused by smoking. The chapter also goes into other lung diseases aside from cancer, like Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and asthma.
In regards to asthma Gregor wrote,
“The mechanisms by which diet affects airway inflammation may lie with the thin coating of fluid that forms the interface between your respiratory-tract lining and the outside air. Using the antioxidants obtain from the fruits and vegetables you eat, this fluid ask as your first line and defense against the free medicals that contribute to asthmatic airway hypersensitivity”(Greger).
I enjoy this book because he backs almost all his statements up to a 97 page long list of credible resources and studies. This book gets you thinking about Disease at a cellular level and how diet can effect you.
I also enjoy this book because it speaks to the community nutritionist and public health passion in me. It makes me want to make fresh fruits and vegetables available to more people. Since diet and lifestyle have a major affect on our health and disease risk, it saddens me that many people in our country do not have the resources necessary to obtain fresh fruits and vegetables.
Thank you for reading a little into my personal life this semester regarding my health. I hope this post gets you thinking about science!
Greger, Michael. How Not to Die. N.p.: Pan, 2017. Print.
Americans typically eat a bland colored diet full of pale and beige foods like white bread, pasta, potatoes and rice. However, colorful foods are the healthiest. You may have heard of the benefits of “eating the rainbow” and this is because of antioxidant.
Thinking Food is Medicine 