This diet, according to researchers, could lower your risk of a certain disease–by up to 55 percent.
Now researchers say it’s a diet all women should try.
According to a new study from the Harvard School of Public Health, women who ate a healthy diet–especially if they were considered a minority–lowered their risk of type 2 diabetes by up to 55 percent.
A healthy diet, in this case, included eating fewer trans and saturated fats, cutting out processed foods, and eating foods rich in fiber, something most nutritionists recommend.
“This study suggests that a healthy overall diet can play a vital role in preventing type 2 diabetes, particularly in minority women who have elevated risks of the disease,” says Jinnie Rhee, a researcher from the Departments of Epidemiology and Nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health. “As the incidence of type 2 diabetes continues to increase at an alarming rate worldwide, these findings can have global importance for what may be the largest public health threat of this century.”
Published in the health journal Diabetes Care, researchers analyzed data from over 150,000 women who participated in the Nurses’ Health Study I and II, two studies which tracked health data associated with women’s health. Here they specifically looked at their dietary intake, including the types of fats, carbohydrates, and other food items they ate on a regular basis.
Researchers then looked at diet questionnaires they filled out after the initial study to see if their dietary habits changed.
Comparing it to the amount of diabetes cases recorded in these studies, they found a startling statistic. For women who ate a healthy diet, such as eating more fiber and avoiding processed foods, their risk of developing diabetes was nearly cut in half. It also appeared to benefit minority women the most, including women of Asian, Hispanic, and African descent.
What benefited these women the most was avoiding sugar-sweetened beverages and cutting out processed meats, however.
“[We wanted] to evaluate racial and ethnic differences in the association between a dietary diabetes risk reduction score and incidence of type 2 diabetes in U.S. white and minority women,” write researchers in the online version of Diabetes Care. “A higher dietary diabetes risk reduction score was inversely associated with risk of type 2 diabetes in all racial and ethnic groups, but the absolute risk difference was greater in minority women.”
The researchers’ conclusion? Diet matters when it comes to minimizing your diabetes risk–especially if you’re from a minority race.
What This Means For You
While some factors of diabetes cannot be prevented, there is one thing you can control: Your diet. And if you happen to be a woman of color, you too can lower your risk by more than half just by eating more fruits, vegetables, and avoiding artificially sweetened foods. So take charge–and get healthy!
Readers: What foods do you eat in your diet?
Sources:
Healthy Diet Associated With Lower Risk of Type 2 Diabetes in Minority Women – ScienceDaily.com
Dietary Diabetes Risk Reduction Score, Race and Ethnicity, and Risk of Type 2 Diabetes in Women – DiabetesJournals.org
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