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A new study, published in the British Medical Journal, found that gluten-free diets could increase the risk of heart attack for people who don't have celiac disease.

"Any time a study like this comes out, that's great," said Olson, marketing specialist with the North Dakota Wheat Commission and immediate past chairwoman of the national Wheat Foods Council.

The study's conclusion: "Long-term dietary intake of gluten was not associated with risk of coronary heart disease. However, the avoidance of gluten may result in reduced consumption of beneficial whole grains, which may affect cardiovascular risk. The promotion of gluten-free diets among people without celiac disease should not be encouraged."

The study examined more than 100,000 people without a history of heart disease. It began in 1986 and was updated every four years until 2010.

The size and length of the study make it particularly meaningful, Olson said.

Celiac disease

Celiac disease, also known as gluten intolerance, prevents people from digesting gluten normally. Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley, rye and other grains. The condition damages the surface of the small intestines and blocks the ability to absorb certain nutrients.

The disease also is associated with an increased risk of coronary heart disease, which is reduced with a gluten-free diet, the study notes.

Estimates of the number of Americans with celiac disease vary, with some as high as 3 million and others much lower. Some people the number is unclear also have a condition called non-celiac gluten sensitivity, in which gluten causes some symptoms even though celiac disease isn't present.

Whatever the actual number of people with celiac disease or non-celiac gluten sensitivity, they're exceeded by the number of Americans who are wary of eating gluten. Twenty-one percent of people surveyed say they "actively try to include gluten-free foods in their diet," according to a 2015 Gallup Poll.

Other surveys estimate that roughly one in three Americans are trying to cut back or eliminate gluten from their diet.

That's bad for farmers who raise wheat especially in North Dakota, which typically leads the nation in production of hard red spring wheat, prized by millers for its gluten strength.

When consumers avoid gluten, "It damages markets and market share. It's just one more thing our dedicated producers have to worry about," said Neal Fisher, administrator of the North Dakota Wheat Commission.

The new study and other studies released previously show that, "Unless you have celiac disease, you shouldn't avoid wheat foods or gluten. In fact, it's quite beneficial to most people's health," Fisher said.

Excerpt from:
Study: Gluten-free diet could be risky - Jamestown Sun

Katy Weber was 14 when she tried dieting for the first time, swilling a SlimFast to combat her new curves.

My body was changing, and I was uncomfortable, says Weber, now 42 and a professional health coach. After that, she says, I spent most of my adult life yo-yo dieting.

None of the dozen or so diets she tried were successful until she began Weight Watchers after her youngest child was born in 2012.

She dropped 50 pounds within 10 months.

I felt like I had totally figured it out, she says. Weber went so far as to work as a Weight Watchers leader in her town of Rosendale, NY. But as time wore on, maintaining her new weight became an unhealthy burden. I was so anxious I felt like I couldnt enjoy myself around food anymore it became my full-time identity.

All that pressure led to a nasty binge-eating habit, and by the summer of 2016, after shed put roughly 30 pounds back on, Weber realized something had to change.

I originally set out to discover why I was binge-eating, because I thought if I could just quit it, Id be the perfect dieter, she says. But in research, I realized [the problem isnt] the bingeing its the dieting. She no longer diets, and says she actively avoids weighing herself but is happy with her body at long last. That number on the scale is so irrelevant to who I am as a person, she says. Im free of the self-loathing and judgment that had plagued me since adolescence.

That number on the scale is so irrelevant to who I am as a person. Im free of the self-loathing and judgment that had plagued me since adolescence.

People are increasingly realizing that dieting can be unhealthier than carrying around those extra 10 or 20 pounds. Last March, a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that the percentage of overweight Americans who are trying to lose weight decreased by 7 percent from 1988 to 2014. The diet-food market has been in decline since 2011, market research firm company Mintel reported in September of 2016. Consumers are shifting toward eating fresher foods rather than those marketed as fat-free or low-calorie. And diet sodas, once a mainstay for those hoping to shed pounds, saw sales fall at a much faster rate than regular sodas in 2016. Even Weight Watchers, which tapped Oprah Winfrey as its spokeswoman in 2015, has had its struggles.

Dieting is on the decline, says neuroscientist Sandra Aamodt, author of Why Diets Make Us Fat: The Unintended Consequences of Our Obsession With Weight Loss. Most peoples experience with it is that they work very hard, and then a year later, theyre heavier.

And, some research has found that dieting can have adverse effects. According to a study by the University of Pennsylvania, published in the journal Obesity in January, feeling bad about your weight can lead to higher stress levels and a higher risk of cardiovascular disease.

We identified a significant relationship between the internalization of weight bias and having a diagnosis of metabolic syndrome, which is a marker of poor health, writes study author Rebecca Pearl.

But whether ditching a diet is a healthy choice depends on what a person does instead, Aamodt says.

If in fact people are just getting frustrated and saying, Theres no point to worrying about my health, nothing matters, and eating a bunch of Big Macs by the pool, then it wouldnt be a good thing from a public-health standpoint, says Aamodt. On the other hand, if people stop [dieting] because theyre realizing there are other ways to be healthy that dont involve using weight control as a measure of success, that would make a difference.

She says that focusing on the numbers on the scale can actually prevent people from living a healthy lifestyle.

Exercising regularly is a very effective way to improve health, whether or not you end up losing weight doing it, which most people dont, she says. But when people dont lose weight, they give up. Thats a place where the focus on dieting does people a disservice its discouraging. The same goes for habits such as eating wholesome foods and getting more sleep.

2011 (left): Katy Weber had tried dozens of diets and weighed roughly 210 pounds. 2013 (middle): Weber lost 60 pounds on Weight Watchers but was obsessed with staying thin. Today (right): She doesnt weigh herself and feels happier than [shes] ever been.Tamara BeckwithMost successful diet-quitters practice mindful, or intuitive, eating. It all essentially comes down to learning to pay attention to when youre hungry or not hungry, Aamodt says.

Focusing too much on weight loss led Isabel Foxen Duke, 30, to develop an eating disorder. She went on her first diet at age 3 on the orders of her pediatrician. By the fifth grade, she was forcing herself to throw up, and her weight fluctuated by up to 60 pounds, as she binged, purged and counted calories.

I didnt realize that dieting was the problem, because I assumed, like most people, that [dieting works and] there was something wrong with me, says Duke, who now works as a health coach and recently moved from New York to San Francisco. I felt like a failure all the time.

By age 20, she was fed up. I kind of had a crash-and-burn moment, where I was like, I cant do this anymore. she says. I thought, this fight is so bad, Id rather just put on weight. So she, like Weber, quit dieting and started eating intuitively, following her bodys hunger cues and cravings, and hasnt looked back. Shes now settled at what she calls her bodys natural weight, and says her self-esteem is no longer tied to what she does or doesnt eat.

If youre going to control your food, theres a really high probability that youre going to lose control at some point, says Duke, who says that her body is now at the weight its supposed to be, naturally. Its not really sustainable, and its not really functional. If youre not eating when youre hungry, youre going to binge.

If people stop [dieting] because theyre realizing there are other ways to be healthy that dont involve using weight control as a measure of success, that would make a difference.

But, some experts say that many Americans should still try to lose weight.

It costs over $6,000 more per year to be obese as a female. Youre spending more money on insurance, says Rochester, NY-based eating psychology expert Susan Peirce Thompson, Ph.D., author of Bright Line Eating. Waistlines are continuing to expand, and the reality is that we cant sustain that.

She pins the blame on the unhealthy foods that make up most modern diets, and helps her patients to cut out food groups such as white flours, to stop fighting against their metabolisms, and to create healthy habits such as eating meals on a regular schedule.

But others say creating strict rules about what goes into your mouth rarely works.

That was the case for Weber. She says that letting her body decide when and what she eats has left her healthier and happier than her dieting days. Ive stopped fighting with [myself], she says. Im trusting my own hunger and fullness cues.

Continued here:
It might be a bad idea to go on a diet - New York Post

By Robert Preidt

HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, May 10, 2017 (HealthDay News) -- Warding off the joint pain of gout may be as easy as eating right, a new study suggests.

Gout, a joint disease that causes extreme pain and swelling, is caused by excess uric acid in the blood. It's the most common form of inflammatory arthritis, and its incidence has risen among Americans over recent decades, Harvard researchers noted.

But the DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) diet -- which is high in fruits and vegetables, and low in salt, sugar and red meat -- can lower levels of uric acid in the blood.

The American Heart Association has long supported the DASH regimen as a way to help avoid heart disease.

"Conversely, the [unhealthy] Western diet is associated with a higher risk of gout," said Dr. Hyon Choi, of Harvard Medical School in Boston, and colleagues. The "Western" diet describes the fatty, salty, sugar-laden fare of many Americans.

One nutritionist wasn't surprised by the new findings, pointing out that the DASH diet is low in compounds called purines, which break down to form uric acid.

"I can see how the DASH diet may benefit someone with gout," said Jen Brennan, clinical nutrition manager at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. "The DASH diet avoids excessive consumption of red and organ meats known to have high purine levels."

Brennan added that the DASH diet "also encourages high intake of fruits and vegetables. We want to encourage fluids and vitamin C for these patients to help rid the body of uric acid, and fruits/vegetables can support this."

In their study, the Harvard researchers analyzed data from more than 44,000 men, aged 40 to 75, who had no prior history of gout. The men provided information about their eating habits every four years between 1986 and 2012.

Over the study period, more than 1,700 of the men developed gout.

During 26 years of follow-up, those who followed the DASH diet -- high in fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, low-fat dairy products and whole grains, and low in salt, sugary drinks and red and processed meats -- were less likely to develop gout than those who ate a typical Western diet, the findings showed.

The Western diet is high in items such as red and processed meats, French fries, refined grains, sweets and desserts.

The study wasn't designed to prove a cause-and-effect relationship. However, the findings suggest that the DASH diet may provide "an attractive preventive dietary approach for the risk of gout," the researchers concluded.

Choi's team noted that many people who have high uric acid levels also have elevated blood pressure, or "hypertension" -- another reason to switch to the healthier DASH diet.

According to the study's lead author, Sharan Rai, of Massachusetts General Hospital, "The diet may also be a good option for patients with gout who have not reached a stage requiring [uric acid]-lowering drugs, or those who prefer to avoid taking drugs." Rai is with Mass General's division of rheumatology, allergy and immunology.

"And since the vast majority of patients with gout also have hypertension, following the DASH diet has the potential of 'killing two birds with one stone,' addressing both conditions together," Rai said in a hospital news release.

However, more studies are needed to track the diet's effectiveness in curbing gout flare-ups, the researchers said.

Dana Angelo White is a registered dietitian at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Conn. She called the new study "another win for the DASH diet, a sensible plan that emphasizes whole foods and a healthy balance of all major food groups. I'm pleased to see a study that highlights the benefits beyond cardiovascular health. If more people ate this way, we would continue to see decreases in all kinds of chronic illness."

The study was published online May 9 in the BMJ.

WebMD News from HealthDay

SOURCES: Jen Brennan, R.D., clinical nutrition manager, Lenox Hill Hospital, New York City; Dana Angelo White, M.S., R.D., registered dietitian and clinical assistant professor of athletic training and sports medicine, Quinnipiac University, Hamden, Conn.; Massachusetts General Hospital, news release, May 9, 2017; BMJ, news release, May 9, 2017

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Diet May Lower Your Odds for Painful Gout - WebMD

When youre looking to shed a few extra pounds, do you really need to fight through hunger pains to know youre losing weight?

Not necessarily, Angel Planells, a Seattle-based dietitian and spokesman for the Academy of Nutrition & Dietetics, told Fox News. If we are methodical about our weight loss approach, we dont have to be hungry, he said.

7 WEIGHT LOSS ROADBLOCKS IN YOUR OFFICE

Lauren Blake, a dietitian at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, agreed, and told Fox News that people shouldnt restrict to the point that theyre always hungry. Theres evidence that says when we restrict too much, it can be harmful to our metabolism, and it supports the loss of lean muscle mass, she said.

Planells and Blake both gave Fox News some tips on warding off hunger pains when on a diet:

1. Dont skip breakfast. To regulate your hunger throughout the day, eat breakfast, whether thats a bowl of cereal, some eggs, or even dinner leftovers, Planells said.

8 LITTLE CHANGES THAT CAN LEAD TO WEIGHT LOSS

2. Keep healthy snacks on hand. To keep your blood sugar stable, avoid going four hours or more without eating, Planells said. Try snacks like yogurt, a handful of nuts, or even peanut butter and fruit to keep you full, he said.

3. Dont drink your calories. Drinks deliver calories a lot faster than solids, Blake said. And since our guts sense fullness based on volume, not calories, drinks wont leave us as satiated as solid foods, she explained.

WHY YOU'RE ALWAYS BLOATED, PLUS 7 FOODS FOR A FLATTER TUMMY

4. Reach for whole, fiber-rich foods. Whole foods like fruits and vegetables are naturally lower in calories, and also have more water content and fiber that will keep you full longer, Blake said. Planells agreed: He noted that while the general American consumes about 10 grams of fiber per day, dietitians generally recommend Americans consume 25 to 30 grams per day.

5. Feature protein in your meals. Protein helps with satiety, Planells said. Try animal-based sources such as beef, chicken, pork, or fish, or plant-based sources like soy and quinoa, which have the added benefit of extra fiber, Planells said.

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6. If youre hungry late at night, drink a glass of water. Sometimes, we can mistake hunger for thirst. If youre hungry late at night, try drinking a glass of water, Planells said.

7. Do order an appetizer if youre dining out. It might seem counterintuitive, but dont skip the appetizer section of the menu if youre dining out. Opt for a bone-based soup or a salad to help fill you up and reduce the risk of overeating during the main course, Blake said.

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7 tips for reducing hunger if you're on a diet - Fox News

Chemical content of bears hair reveals surprising eating habits

Researchers from Canada and the US have revealed new insights into the eating habits and hair-growth patterns of a wild grizzly bear population, by analysing the chemical content of their fur.

The team led by Garth Mowat, the head of the Canadian governments Natural Resource Science Section in the Kootenay region of British Columbia, was studying the dietary patterns of grizzlies around the provinces Stikine river. By examining the ratios of different isotopes of carbon, nitrogen and sulfur in the samples, the researchers could determine what proportion of vegetation, fish, or land mammals like moose and mountain goats made-up the bears diet.

While researchers sometimes look at animals droppings to learn about their eating habits, Mowat explains that this method is not always accurate. What you have in the scat is what they didnt absorb, and so theres a strong bias against foods that are highly digestible, he says. So for example salmon was regularly underestimated in the diet because it almost doesnt appear in the scats. To overcome this issue, scientists regularly turn to laboratory-based methods, such as isotope analysis, for more precise measurements

The team set up traps that could snag a few hairs from a grizzly bears back as it scratched itself on a tree trunk, or made its way down a trail to a feeding ground. Back in the lab, the isotopic analyses brought some unexpected results.

Surprisingly, even during the peak of the salmon season many bears shun the river, choosing instead to continue foraging for vegetation. That was the most intriguing result to us. We thought that any bear that lives within walking distance of the salmon stream would go down and eat some salmon, says Mowat.

While some female bears with cubs, and smaller males, might avoid the salmon streams to duck confrontation with aggressive larger males, Mowat points out that in other coastal regions, smaller bears still manage to eat salmon from very young ages.

Throughout the year, bears diets shift from protein-rich to fattier foodstuffs, as they build up their fat reserves for the winter. Because carbon-13 is often depleted in fatty tissues, this complicated the researchers task, as they would observe significant variation in isotope patterns among hairs from individual bears.

Once they have satisfied their protein needs, they will start focusing on the parts of the animal that are high in fat, because transferring fat to fat fish fat to bear fat is the most efficient chemical pathway, says Mowat. [A salmons] brain is mostly fat, so they break the skull open and eat the brain. The roe is high in fat, and then the skin, even though it doesnt seem very good to eat to us, is largely fat. These selective eating habits meant that Mowats team would often come across gruesome scenes of skinned and decapitated salmon carcasses strewn across the banks of the river.

They also found that the wild bears hair grew later in the year than previously thought. Previously, it was believed that the regions grizzly bears started growing their thicker winter coats from May or June. However, the presence of the isotopic signature of salmon consumption in longer hair samples showed that in fact the bears started to grow their thicker coats later in the summer, as it would not be possible for this signature to appear before the salmon had returned to the Stikine. This finding has important implications for other researchers who want to study bear behaviour by analysing their hair.

One of their more important observations is that some bears dont start growing hair until late in the summer. Weve done a lot of the basic research regarding stable isotopes and their use on bears by doing feeding studies with captive bears, says Charles Robbins, an expert on grizzly bears from Washington State University, US. While we can initiate new hair growth in May if we feed plenty of food, we can also delay it into August and September by feeding at levels where the bears either just maintain their weight or slightly lose weight. Many field researchers have wanted to section hair to look at diets throughout the hair growing season, but Ive warned them that they need to fully understand the temporal aspects of hair growth and not assume when hair starts growing.

Jeff Curtis, an environmental scientist from the University of British Colombia, whose lab ran much of the isotopic analyses, explains that his team are now using these techniques to track the habits of other animals. In particular, they have been tracking European starlings an invasive species in North America that cause severe damage to food crops. Weve been using a multi-element approach to identify where young starlings immigrate from to damage crops, and they are what they eat weve been able to basically determine where to concentrate those efforts to try to control them, says Curtis.

This article is reproduced with permission fromChemistry World. The article wasfirst publishedon May 10, 2017.

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Grizzly Diet Has Several Surprises, Bear Hair Chemistry Shows - Scientific American

Men's Health

The Best Way to Diet For Your Personality Type Men's Health In this latest episode of The Men's Health Podcast, we interview Jen Widerstrom, a former American Gladiator and the current star trainer on NBC's The Biggest Loser. Jen is also the author of the new book Diet Right for Your Personality Type.

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The Best Way to Diet For Your Personality Type - Men's Health

About 20 years ago, I came across a fascinating research article in a prominent medical journal called the Lancet that highlighted the cardiovascular benefits of a newly described diet. What caught my attention was the very significant improvement in heart outcomes for people who followed this diet.

Lets go through some of the details. This research was done in France, and enrolled 600 people who had had a previous heart attack. The 600 people were divided into two groups, one of which was trained to follow a Mediterranean diet, and the second group was asked to follow a conventional heart healthy diet. The patients were monitored for five years and at the end of five years the two groups were compared.

The Mediterranean diet group was considered as the experimental group and the heart healthy diet group was the control group. At the end of the study period, it was found that there were 16 cardiac deaths in the control group and three in the experimental group. In addition, there were 17 subsequent heart attacks in the control group and five in the experimental group. As you can see from these statistics, there was very significant improvement in cardiac outcomes in the Mediterranean diet cohort. The magnitude of the benefit of the Mediterranean diet was to such a degree that it exceeded the benefit of certain medications that are used to treat heart disease.

What caught my attention was that after the publication of this study, there was very little publicity generated in the lay newspapers and magazines about such dramatic findings. I was so intrigued by the beneficial results of this study that I reached out via email to the lead author, Dr. Michel de Lorgeril from France, inquiring as to the details of this Mediterranean diet. He graciously responded to me and provided me with some information about the Mediterranean diet.

Fast forward to 2017 and many of us have heard about the health benefits of the Mediterranean diet. It has been described in some circles as an anti-inflammation diet. This is important because according to our current understanding, inflammation contributes to many chronic health conditions, including coronary heart disease, arthritis, colitis and other conditions. The Mediterranean diet is also associated with a reduced risk of cancer, Parkinsons disease and Alzheimers disease. For these reasons many health care organizations have recommended adoption of the Mediterranean diet in order to prevent many major chronic diseases.

You may be wondering at this time what the Mediterranean diet consists of? The emphasis is on eating primarily plant-based foods such as fruits and vegetables, as well as whole grains, legumes and nuts. For example, residents of Greece are said to consume about nine servings a day of antioxidant rich fruits and vegetables.

There is also an emphasis on eating healthy fats such as olive oil and canola oil to replace butter and margarine. Olive oil provides monounsaturated fat, which is a type of fat that can help to reduce LDL (bad) cholesterol. In addition, eating nuts, like almonds, cashews, pistachios and walnuts also provide beneficial fats. Using olive oil and vinegar as a salad dressing is a healthy choice, as well. Using herbs and spices instead of salt to flavor our foods is also recommended. Red meat should be limited to only a few times a month. Fish and chicken can be eaten about twice a week. Drinking red wine in moderation is also common in European countries where the Mediterranean diet is followed. And last but not least, getting plenty of exercise helps to promote the heart healthy features of the diet.

Dr. Mark Roth is an internal medicine physician with University Hospitals.

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Benefits of the Mediterranean diet - Cleveland Jewish News

Ah, the NFL offseasonthe time we take a brief respite from setting our fantasy lineups as pro football players vacation in luxurious destinations likeSaint-Tropez or other such places this reporter can neither afford nor pronounce. That is, unless said football player is five-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady, who is most likely grinding away at some ridiculous workout in "The Grit Room."

What's that? You don't know what a Grit Room is? Clearly, you don't work at your craft at elite levels.

A piece in Men's Journal this week profiled Brady's longtime trainerand business partner Alex Guerrero. Or, as writer Mike Chambersdescribed Guerrero in the article, he's the quarterback's "trainer, nutritionist, counselor, spiritual guide, massage therapist, and godfather to Brady's youngest son."

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For the story, Chambers rehabbed hisshattered heel with Guerrero at the TB12(Tom Brady's number with the New England Patriotsis 12) Sports Therapy Centerin Foxborough, Massachusetts, which hasthemed rooms, including the aforementioned Grit Room,the Determination Room, the Perseverance Roomand the We Got This Room. Chambers' rehab process withGuerrerocomplete with casualrun-ins with Brady's supermodel wife Gisele Bndchen and Patriots tight-end Rob Gronkowskisounded suspiciously like readjusting his life to mirror Brady's. The writer was pushed physically and put on a diet that eliminated coffee and nightshadevegetables such as mushrooms and tomatoes that apparently lead todastardly inflammation. That theory haslong been a driving force inBrady's diet, which purportedly also featureswhole grains, lean meats andabsolutely nowhite sugar, white flour or MSG. And don't you dare approach Brady with a strawberry.

"I've never eaten a strawberry in my life. I have no desire to do that," the quarterback told New York Magazine in September without expanding much further on, why, exactly he has a crusade against the sweet, red berries.

Guerrero's methods have long been controversial, Boston Magazine publishinga 2015 piece titled, "Tom Bradys Personal Guru Is a Glorified Snake-Oil Salesman." He had apparentlyfalsely called himself a doctor in an infomercial that pitched super greens that prevented cancer, AIDSand diabetes, as well as helping folks lose massive amounts of weight. The Federal Trade Commission came down on him for that and later for purportedly pitching a drink he claimed could prevent concussions, according to the Boston Magazine article.

Guerrero, meanwhile, put writer Chambers through hard training despitehis foot being "crushed like a soda can." The trainer saidhe was retraining the brain to not think of the foot as injured. Ten weeks after starting rehab, Chambers said he was rock-climbing, returning to the activity that injured his heel in the first place. When it came to the injury'sprogress his doctor, Chambers wrote, was in disbelief.

Guess anything is possible with enough Grit (and, of course, no nightshade vegetables).

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Tom Brady's Training Program Features a 'Grit Room' and His Diet Is ... - Newsweek

Gluten-free diets do not lower your risk for heart disease and may even lead to some health concerns, a new studypublished in BMJ reports.

Gluten is a natural protein found in wheat, rye, and barley. In recent years, many people have cut the substance out of their diet because they believe it leads to better health.However, no long-term studies had looked at how that change affects the risk of chronic conditions.

In the recent research, a team of U.S.-based scientists found that cutting out gluten tends to lower a persons intake of whole grains. As those grains are linked to numerous health benefits including a lower risk for heart disease losing them can lead to problems.

As a result, the team states that, unless a person has celiac disease, they should not shy away from gluten. It can be reduced in some cases, but for the most part, people should balance non-gluten foods with ones that contain whole grains.

Researchers reached this conclusion by analyzing data from a study of more than 110,000 U.S. health professionals. All of the subjects periodically answered questions over a 26-year period about the different foods they consumed. This allowed the team to estimate how much gluten each patient had in their diet, as well as see whether or not they experienced a heart attack during the study.

After dividing the subjects into five groups, the researchers found that those who ate the most gluten did not have a higher risk for heart attack than those who ate the least. In fact, the data showed that gluten initially appeared to be linked with a lower risk of heart attack. However, this connection is not tied to gluten consumption, but rather the intake of whole grains.

These findings do not support the promotion of a gluten-restricted diet with a goal of reducing coronary heart disease risk, the researchers wrote in their study, according toLive Science.

This study is purely observational, which means no concrete conclusions can be drawn about cause and effect. However, the scientists believe there is enough evidence in the data to show that the reduction of gluten may lead to specific heart-related health problems and that people should make sure to keep whole grains in their usual diet.

Any time you eliminate whole categories of food youve been used to eating, you run the risk of nutritional deficiencies, said co-author Peter H.R. Green, director of Columbia Universitys Celiac Disease Center, according to Newsweek. Unless people are very careful, a gluten-free diet can lack vitamins, minerals, and fiber.

Joseph Scalise is an experienced writer who has worked for many different online websites across many different mediums. While his background is mainly rooted in sports writing, he has also written and edited guides, ebooks, short stories and screenplays. In addition, he performs and writes poetry, and has won numerous contests. Joseph is a dedicated writer, sports lover and avid reader who covers all different topics, ranging from space exploration to his personal favorite science, microbiology.

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Gluten-free diet may come with health complications, study reports - Science Recorder

May 5, 2017 -- About one in five Americans drinks diet soda every day, according to the CDC. Is that a good thing?

Numerous studies over the past several years have reported links between diet soda and weight gain, diabetes, heart problems, and other health issues. Most recently, headlines sounded alarms about a higher chance of dementia and stroke among diet soda drinkers.

That may sound worrisome, but experts say you dont need to clear the diet drinks out of your fridge just yet. Many questions must be answered before well know whether diet soda raises your chance of health problems.

Boston University researcher Matthew Pase, PhD, and colleagues examined 10 years of health information from nearly 3,000 American adults over 45 to count the number who had a stroke. They did the same for nearly 1,500 American adults over 60 to determine how many developed dementia.

After accounting for a variety of things that could influence their health, such as age, physical activity, and waist size, the researchers found that diet soda drinkers nearly tripled their odds of stroke and dementia, compared with those who drank no diet soda.

Scary, right? Not necessarily, says Pase. Only 81, or 5%, of the people in the study were diagnosed with dementia, and only 97, or 3%, had a stroke.

At the end of the day, were talking about small numbers of people, says Pase. I dont think that people should be alarmed.

Pase also makes clear that his studys results, published in April in the journal Stroke, dont explain the link. Do diet sodas cause health problems like stroke and dementia? Or do people who have higher chances of getting such health problems choose to drink diet soda, perhaps to try to cut sugar and calories in their diets? Pase cant say.

Other studies have also tied health concerns to diet soda broadly rather than to specific artificial sweeteners. (The FDA has approved six for use in drinks and food.) Like Pases study, they could not show whether diet soft drinks were to blame.

The authors of these studies suggest many explanations for the links between diet soda and health concerns. In addition to potentially changing gut bacteria, artificial sweetenersmay stimulate the appetite, which could lead to overeating. Researchers dont know yet whether these explanations will prove to be accurate.

David Ludwig, MD, PhD, says that studies like these raise important concerns about diet soft drinks, but they're not proof that we need to be worried.

We need more clinical trials, says Ludwig, an endocrinologist and professor of nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and author of Always Hungry.

Ludwig conducted a test in 2012. In it, he randomly divided 224 overweight or obese teens into two groups. One group continued their normal habit of drinking sugary sodas; the other group switched to diet sodas. After a year, the diet soda group had dropped a little bit of weight, compared with those who drank regular sodas. By the 2-year mark, however, the two groups were about the same.

In another clinical trial, participants who drank diet soda lost about 5 pounds more than water drinkers over a 12-week period. However, that study was funded by the American Beverage Association, a trade group that represents soda makers.

Overall, says Ludwig, clinical trials have shown that if you switch from sugary sodas to diet ones, your weight will benefit. However, no clinical trial has yet been long enough to answer whether diet sodas affect the odds of having diabetes or whether they are as safe as unsweetened drinks like water. Diabetes and obesity, Ludwig says, are the primary focus of concerns about diet soda.

Compared to unsweetened beverages, asks Ludwig, are they causing harm?

One possible explanation for the link between diet sodas and weight gain and diabetes risk: The sweeteners in diet soft drinks may trick you into overcompensating, or eating a greater number calories than you normally would, says Christopher Gardner, PhD, director of nutrition studies at the Stanford Prevention Research Center. This can happen in one of two ways.

The first, he says, is psychological. If you choose a no-calorie diet soda over a regular soda, you may reward yourself later in the day with a treat. And that treat may have more calories than you saved by avoiding the sugary soft drink.

Your brain chemistry may play a role as well. The sweetness in the diet soda may prime your brain to expect a calorie boost. When no calories are on the way, that could trigger your appetite and lead you to eat more.

Diet sodas may help you with weight loss if you dont overcompensate, but thats a big if, says Gardner, who's also a professor of medicine at Stanford University.

Ludwig suggests that drinking artificially sweetened beverages may affect your taste buds in ways that make you less likely to choose healthy foods.

You may find fruit less appealing because its less sweet than your soda, and vegetables may become inedible, he speculates.

Both Gardner and Ludwig acknowledge that their theories are just that: Theories.

The American Beverage Association said in a statement that the FDA and other health organizations consider artificial sweeteners safe, and no research has shown otherwise.

Scientific evidence does show us that beverages containing these sweeteners can be a useful tool as part of an overall weight management plan. Americas beverage companies support and encourage balanced lifestyles by providing people with a range of beverage choices -- with and without calories and sugar -- so they can choose the beverage that is right for them.

Seattle-based dietitian Angel Planells encourages people to choose water over soda of any kind. But, he says, diet soda can fit into your diet as long as you make other healthy food choices.

If you drink a diet soda, that wont make up for eating a super-size fast food meal, says Planells, a spokesman for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

Breaking the diet soda habit, if you choose to do so, can be tough, says Planells. He recommends starting with baby steps rather than going cold turkey. If you drink five or six diet sodas a day, drop down to two, to three, and then to one. Just be sure to drink water so you stay hydrated.

Ludwig advises people who want to get off sugary drinks to consider diet soda a temporary choice.

I tell my patients to continue making the transition to unsweetened beverages, he says. We know that diet sodas are better than sugary beverages in terms of body weight, but we dont know if better is actually good.

Christopher Gardner, PhD, director of nutrition studies, Stanford Prevention Research Center; professor of medicine, Stanford University.

David Ludwig, MD, PhD, endocrinologist and professor of nutrition, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and author of Always Hungry.

Matthew Pase, PhD, researcher in neurology, Boston University School of Medicine.

Angel Planells, registered dietitian and spokesman for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

American Beverage Association statement.

Bleich, S. American Journal of Public Health, March 2014.

CDC: Consumption of Diet Drinks in the United States, 2009-2010.

Ebbeling, C. New England Journal of Medicine, October 11, 2012.

FDA: High-Intensity Sweeteners

Gardener, H. Journal of General Internal Medicine, September 2012.

Greenwood, D. British Journal of Nutrition, September 14, 2014.

Imamura, F. BMJ, July 21, 2015.

Pase, M. Stroke, April 20, 2017.

Peters, J. Obesity, June 2014.

Suez, J. Nature, September 17, 2014.

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