'Paleo' Diet
Ashley Amicon
Article Summary
There is a new diet out there that is said to have benefits on women specifically regarding their heart health and their waistlines. The Paleo diet is a diet that dates back to the times when humans had to hunt and gather to obtain their food. The food that is included in the diet is foods that one could hunt--lean meats and fish--and food that can be gathered--fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds. This diet also tries to exclude foods that are related to dairy products. The diet was tested on "35 postmenopausal women who were obese but had normal blood sugar levels," (Thompson 2016, p. 1). A control group was also tested and they followed a low-fat diet. Both of the groups found a significant weight loss. The results showed that the Paleo diet does have some health benefits, "You're basically eliminating all processed and simple carbohydrates, which we know is one of the exacerbation's or causes of overweight, obesity, and insulin resistance, " (Apovian 2016, p. 1). Overall the Paleo diet did show to have some health benefits, but it was said to have downsides. One of the downsides was that the diet was not as available to people as other diets are and that causes a problem.
Article Critique
To begin with, the writer of this article, "'Paleo' Diet May Help Older Women's Hearts, Waistlines," is Dennis Thompson. Thompson is a senior reporter for HealthDay and has been a reporter for 25 years. For 10 years he has been working as a freelance health reporter where he writes online articles. Since Thompson has been working as a health reporter for 10 years, his article is credible. The US News Health website is what sponsored this HealthDay article. This is a well written article that includes information that is useful towards the overall idea that this diet is helpful in regards to women's heart health and in their waistlines (meaning them loosing weight). This article contained scientific data. There was an experimental group that was given the Paleo diet and then there was a control group that was just put on a low-fat diet. In the article there were people who were quoted in the article. There was a Caroline Blomquist who is a doctoral student at Umea Univesity in Sweden and then a Dr. Caroline Apovian who is the director of the Nutrition and Weight Management Center at Boston Medical Center. Blomquist was for the Paleo diet and thought that it was a good idea because of the obesity pandemic her in the United States. Apovian quoted about how this study shouldn't even be called the Paleo diet but more of a Paleo diet mixed with a Mediterranean diet. I think this article was a little misleading because there wasn't a clear idea of what the verdict was regarding heart health; was it successful? Was it not successful? Those questions were not answered and that leaves a lot of speculation to if this diet worked on heart health or not. The article answered the question on the decrease in obesity seeing that people did lose weight in both the experimental group and the control group. I would have to look more into this diet to see if this diet is really something that is successful or just another diet fad that is just trying to lure people in.
Citation
Dennison, Thomas. 'Paleo' Diet May Help Older Women's Hearts, Waistlines. USNewsHealth. April 7th, 2016.