I want evidence!
If you are like me, you wonder about the source of information you find on the web. Sometimes an article sounds good, but is it really just a good hypothesis or is there any proof to back it up? I started this blog as a way to share the result of my obsessive research about issues related to health and nutrition. I present only the facts that I found backed up by scientific studies, and I link to those references so that you can read them for yourself. If you read on the web something that you find promising but want to make sure there is a scientific basis to it, come to this place and take a look. And if I haven’t researched the topic yet, please feel free to submit it to me so that I can make it the subject of a future article.
Health and nutrition – nutrition and health
When food is what makes us sick, it seems obvious to control food to get better. Someone with celiac disease, an intolerance to gluten causing intestinal inflammation, will need to avoid all foods possibly containing gluten, i.e. wheat, pasta, bread, flour, etc. in order to remain symptom-free. It is less obvious to make the link between other diseases and nutrition. However, many diseases have been described to decrease in intensity with the use of specific diets. Those observations often start from anecdotal reports, which remain controversial for long periods of time, until scientific proofs can be found. For example, the ketogenic diet (a high fat, low carbohydrate diet), which has been described since 1920’ to help patients suffering from epilepsy, has only recently gained the support of experimental scientific studies. I am interested in the strong relationship between nutrition and health, and I want to understand how specific diets can help optimize health and quality of life.
Fighting ignorance with facts
There is actually a lot of useful information out there, but it is often buried in an ocean of exaggerations or plain wrong facts, which makes getting informed tedious and discouraging. I research direct evidence in support of relationships between nutrition and health and disease. When direct evidence is lacking, I research indirect indications and present them to you for your information and criticism. Please feel free to add the result of your own research or experience in your comments. Let’s all get informed and think together. Let’s fight ignorance with facts.
Copyright (see copyright page): © “Food, Science and Health” (FoodScienceHealth.com) by Barbara Cerf-Allen, 2013 All Rights Reserved
Disclaimer: I am not advocating any of the above mentioned diets, nor am I making any claim about their usefulness for your specific condition. I am not a medical doctor and I am not giving medical advice. This blog is about sharing scientific information and my personal anecdotal experience,
Food Science and Health 
Katbook54 here. I just read your impressive bio. I am rethinking bothering you with my questions as you must be very busy. One thing I am learning is how this diet is used for epilepsy. I have multiple sclerosis- and autoimmune disease that eats away at the coating on my nerves. A Dr. Swank says that it is a imperative that ms patients use an extremely low fat diet. Do you think it is a good thing to eat Keto for multiple sclerosis patients? Just a thought. So many opinions out there I’m getting a bit overwhelmed.
Hi Katbook, thank you for your comments! I am not a medical doctor and I cannot advise you in any way about the management of MS, however, your question about how diets and especially the ketogenic diet can interfere with MS is very interesting. This is exactly the type of questions I wonder about on a daily basis and what motivated this blog. I will soon write a specific post about diets aiming at help people with MS, and I will research that subject in more detail. One thing that I know is that the ketogenic diet has been proposed as a supplementary treatment for MS and that protective effects of the ketogenic diets have been described in the animal model of MS (I can give you those references if you want). Maybe you can discuss those facts with your doctor and see what he/she thinks?