How to find the perfect food point?
How do you measure the quality of people’s meals? Well, “what could be more nutritious than a vegetarian diet?” Indeed, when comparing the quality of vegetarian and non-vegetarian diets, plant-based diets tend to be more successful, and higher dietary quality in vegetarian diets may help explain greater improvements in health outcomes. However, vegetarians seem to eat more refined grains, eating more foods like white rice and white bread that have been stripped of most of their nutrients. So, just because you’re eating a vegetarian diet doesn’t mean you’re eating as healthily as possible.
Those familiar with science know the primary health importance of eating whole plant foods. So, how about a scoring system that simply includes how many cups of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans, peas, split peas, and lentils, and how many ounces of nuts and seeds per 1,000 calories (or not counting white potatoes)? Just looking at the total amount of plant foods doesn’t mean you’re not putting donuts in your mouth. Therefore, you can think about the ratio of intake, based on calories or weight, to determine the portion of your diet that is complete plant foods. If so, you’ll get points added if you eat things like foods derived from animals—meat, milk, or eggs—or added sugars and fats.
My favorite food scale is McCarty’s “phytochemical index,” which I’ve mentioned before. I like it for its simplicity, “it is defined as the percentage of food calories that come from foods rich in phytochemicals.” It assigns a score from 0 to 100, based on the percentage of your calories that come from foods rich in phytochemicals, which are organic compounds found in plants that may contribute to many of the health benefits of eating whole plant foods. “Monitoring phytochemical intake in a clinical setting can be very helpful” in helping people use their diets for better health and disease prevention. However, quantifying phytochemicals in food or tissue samples is impractical, tedious, and expensive. But this concept of phytochemical index measurement can be another simple way to monitor phytochemical intake.
In theory, a whole, plant-based or vegan diet that doesn’t include refined grains, white potatoes, alcohol, added fat, and added sugar can reach a total of 100 points. Sadly, most Americans today would be lucky to score only 20 points. What happened? In 1998, our shopping baskets filled about 20% of total plant foods; recently, that has slowed down, as you can see below and at 2:49 in my video Effect of Plant-Based Diets Assessed.
Wouldn’t it be interesting if researchers used this phytochemical indicator to try to link it to health effects? That’s exactly what they did. We know that research has shown that a vegetarian diet has a protective association with weight and body weight. For example, a meta-analysis of twelve studies showed that vegetarians had a significantly lower weight and BMI compared to non-vegetarians. And more research shows that eating more fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes may be protective regardless of whether meat is eaten. Therefore, researchers want to use an index that gives a score for whole plant foods. They use a phytochemical index as well, as you may remember from previous videotracked people’s weight over several years, using a scale of 0 to 100 to indicate what percentage of a person’s diet is complete plant foods. And even though the healthiest tier only had about 40 points, meaning most of their diet was still made up of processed foods and animal products, just making whole plant foods the majority of the diet may help prevent weight gain and reduce body fat. So, it’s not all or nothing. Any steps we can take to increase our whole plant-based diet can be beneficial.
Many studies have been carried out since then, most pointing in the same direction of various health effects-showing, for example, a high diet of healthy plants is associated with almost a third of the problems of abdominal obesity and very low barriers of high triglycerides. Therefore, the index may be a “helpful diet goal for weight loss,” where there is less focus on calorie consumption and more on increasing consumption of these high-nutrition, low-calorie foods over time. Other studies also suggest that the same is true for childhood obesity.
Even at the same weight, with the same amount of belly fat, those who eat a plant-based diet tend to have a higher insulin sensitivity, which means that the insulin they make works better in their bodies, probably because of the combination of plants that reduce inflammation and quench free radicals. Indeed, the likelihood of hyperinsulinemia—an indication of insulin resistance—was gradually reduced with greater plant consumption. Not surprisingly, researchers found a 91% lower chance of prediabetes in people who got more than half of their calories from healthy plant foods.
They also had significantly lower odds of metabolic syndrome and high blood pressure. There was about half the chance of being diagnosed with high blood pressure over a three-year period among those who ate more healthy plant foods. Even mental health can be affected—about 80% less stress, 2/3 less anxiety, and 70% less mental stress, as you can see below and at 5:15 in mine. video.
Is there a connection between the phytochemical index of food and benign breast diseases, such as fibrocystic diseases, fatty necrosis, ductal ectasia, and all types of benign tumors? Yes—70 percent lower probability is seen in those with higher scores. But what about breast cancer? A diet high in healthy plants was actually associated with a lower risk of breast cancer, even after controlling for a long list of other factors. And not just a little bit. Eating twice the amount of plants compared to the typical American diet was linked to a more than 90% lower risk of breast cancer.
Doctor’s Note
You can read more about the phytochemical index at Calculate Your Healthy Eating Score.
If you’re concerned about protein, check Flashback Friday: Are Vegetarians Getting Enough Protein?
It doesn’t have to be all or nothing, though. Do Flexitarians Live Longer?
For more on plant-based waste, see Friday Favorites: Is A Vegan Diet Always Healthy?.
