I’m researching Ketogenic (Dr Newport) and Paleo like (Dr Wahls) dietary guidelines (applications for PD). Anybody w experience & objective outcomes, please report?
Ketogenic (Newport) and Paleo-like (Wahls... - Cure Parkinson's
Ketogenic (Newport) and Paleo-like (Wahls) dietary guidelines for PD
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AmyLindy
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Hi Amy! My husband was on a Keto diet when he was first diagnosed. He lost 30 lbs initially. He continued to lose weight and lost another 15 lbs. Can't say if he's benefited or not but he is now trying to gain some weight back with no success. He started again the Mediterranean diet and has gained 2 lbs within the last 2 weeks. I believe Mediterranean diet is the best of all diets. Eating lots of olives (Kalamata) and olive oil and trying to avoid sugar and processed foods is a healthy way to go. My motto "Everything in moderation" as our bodies need all the different nutrients available in different kinds of foods. Counting caloric intake is another way to benefit from. Are you on a specific diet now?
Hi&No I am not on a strict dietary protocol yet but am finding research lately that supports Keto/Paleo in PD. Sounds like your husband’s weight loss was significant- was it intended (was he overweight)? Not everyone loses weight (nor is it the direct intention) on Keto/Paleo, but it can be a benefit to some, for sure.
He was overweight, but he didn't need to lose 45lbs, 25lbs would be ideal to lose. My husband was put on Keto diet by Cleveland Clinic Functional Medicine for pelvic rehab as they wrote on their instructions. I know that Keto diet is recommended for weight loss.
My husband is also Dr. Mischley's patient and she is for Mediterranean diet. She loved it when we mentioned it to her. Today, she asked my husband to stop probiotics and some other supplements he takes.
He (husband) is early stage PD, too. Exercise has been a way of life for us both, he didn't start exercising after diagnosis.
Despe, I am curious as to why Dr Mischley recommended to stop probiotics? I am off and on toward them. What other supplements did she recommend stopping and why, if you don’t mind my asking.
Hello PDGal14! Remember every PD person is unique. She recommended that my husband stops Pre- and Probiotics based on tests. It has to do with his gut. She wants him on:
Intranasal Glutathione
Fish Oil
COQ10
Vitamin B12 and
Cobalt (short term)
Vitamin C
Vitamin D
Turmeric
Magnesium
Manganese (short term)
Lithium Orotate
I largely follow Dr Laurie Mischley’s advice for food and nutrition supplements. And modify as I learn more (my profile has specifics). I am early Stage PD and am still a bit of a zealot in finding “all the right things” to support delayed progression ( including exercise)!
I agree with Despe. Since diagnosed 2.5 years ago and after reading bout every diet under the sun I decided on Med with low sugars. Makes sense and realistic to maintain. I lost 25 pounds and bp is much better and I can exercise better as well. I do lots of olive oil as well as Mct.
Low carb and +MCT is the direction I’m going. There are lots of labels for that but frankly I can’t stick w any singular approach without cheats and disappointments, so for now, it’s a targeted hybrid approach! The research/papers and books by Dr. Terry Wahls (Paleo like) and Dr. Mary Newport (MCT) hold intrigue and will lure me in over time, I imagine.
I too am wary of special "abnormal" diets and eat essentially a Mediterranean diet. (Given I now live in the Mediterranean, arguably anything I choose to eat is a Mediterranean diet, but you know what I mean). I am particularly focused on the microbiome and it's role in PD, and wary of missing nutrients in restrictive diets.
Way to go Winnie! If you don't mind my asking, where do you live? 
I buy different kinds of pasta made of green lentils, spinach, and chickpeas, they taste like the real thing!
Despe, I live in the village next to Rennes le chateau. A famous village about an hour south of Carcassonne and a big hour West of Perpignan. In the Pyrenees. In France. In good traffic I can paddle in the Mediterranean an hour and 20 minutes after leaving home.
Lucky you! Paddle to Greece.
Mercola books “Fat for Fuel” and Ketogenic Cookbook are pretty good references. There’s a website called gnom-gnom that has great keto recipes. Keto is not an easy diet for most people. As somebody said the best diet is one you can stay on. I had a keto coach in the beginning and that helped me a lot. Cutting out grains was pretty easy. I still eat more fruit than I probably should. I use Keto Diet app to help me stay on track. I-F important component.
My coach told me if you work out a lot, which I do, need to add carbs once or twice a week, because need insulin to build muscle mass. That doesn’t mean get pizza and ice cream. Can add in sweet potatoes or bananas. Beans are relatively high in carbs and fiber. The main difference between Keto and Paleo is if you eat meat, keto serving size = 3oz. More than that supposedly metabolizes as Carbs. Sorry for random notes.
Good luck and hope it helps.
John G
Can you explain what you mean by "metabolizes as carbs"?
It sounds maybe a bit related to the nutrition advice I had from Dr David Frape, who was the adviser to a pet food company I worked with. He formulated his foods to have the correct balance of carbs, protein, and oils and fats. I am doubtless dumbing down what he explained to me a lot, but in essence it was:
Food is mostly, water, carbs, protein, oils and fats, fibre, ash, and trace elements. Water, fibre, ash and trace elements have no significant calorific value. Our bodies need to burn energy (measured in calories). Carbohydrate are the primary fuel source, most readily burned by our bodies and about 4 calories per gram. Protein also has about 4 calories per gram. Oils and fats are about 9 calories per gram and the next choice fuel. They are slower burning (so if you are about to run a marathon and need a lot of quick burn fuel, eat carbs) but easily converted into fuel in our bodies
Protein can be burned, but is primarily used for building and repairing tissue. If you have too few carbs or oils and fats in your diet, your body will burn protein, but it has to work hard to do so, and it puts a strain on your liver and kidneys. "A bit like running a hot engine with the choke still on" was how it was described to me.
So, based on that, I would have expected that if you follow a keto type of diet, the important thing is to ensure the lost carbs are replaced with oils and fats, and you don't risk putting yourself in a position where your body has to try to burn protein as fuel
That all sounds right. In Keto the focus is always on getting enough healthy fats into your diet, which, surprisingly, is not as easy as it sounds.
- JG
Precisely- great analogies @WinnieThePoo
Thanks reedboat2
Great advice!! going to read again several times.
For any information related to the Keto diet, I always follow
myhealthyclick.com/?s=keto+...
You can use some of this article for reference.
@RobertReny: Ru PD? I am intrigued but cautious about Keto - I need so much fiber and variety w added fruits seems necessary which would kick me out of Ketosis. Are u a user of exogenous Ketone sources/MCT like Dr. Mary Newport or others recommend?
This talk is fascinating and covers diet, probiotics, etc. Watch the on demand podcast by Dr Zach Bush. It is well worth the time as he packs so much info into it.
I have been on keto diet for about 17 months. Despite consuming higher quantity of fat my weight dropped around 50 lbs, 4 inches off the waist, blood pressure now in the middle of the normal range and swollen hands and ankles have disappeared. My bowel habits have been transformed and an analysis of my gut biome was pretty good. I have also cut my Sinimet dosage in half, however, the transition was rough and caused me a few problems.
The biggest change, for me, has been to mood. I suffered from periods of anxiety / compulsive behaviour for many years and this seemed to worsen as neurologists prescribed more Sinimet. I now worry about very little and regularly leave home without feeling the need to check doors / windows / switches etc, etc.
Hard to say if it is the ketones or that I have stopped eating something (e.g. grains) that were toxic to me. Tim Spector (gut health guru) reckons that reactions to different foods are highly individualistic so you need to work out what works best for you.
I'm trying the Longevity Diet by Dr. Valter Longo. His diet is similar to the Mediterranean diet, but limits you to small portions of "carefully chosen, mercury-free fish". Otherwise, he just has guidelines to adjust the diet for people of different ages, conditions, etc. Nothing too onerous. For example, I have trouble getting mercury-safe fish, so I'm just adding more nuts and avocados for more omega-3 instead.
From his book, here are the bullet points of his diet (leaving out details under bullet points):
* Follow a pescetarian diet. Aim for a diet close to 100% plant- and fish-based.
* Consume low but sufficient proteins (depends on weight and age).
* Minimize bad (saturated or trans) fats and (simple) sugars.
* Maximize good (polyunsaturated) fats and good (complex) carbs.
* Be nourished (this just means eating a wide variety of unprocessed or lightly processed foods).
He has a few more bullet points, but the above list is mostly it. He endorses using intermittent fasting and something he calls FMD (Fasting Mimicking Diet) which he invented about 10 years ago.
FMD is really interesting. It's not a "diet" in the normal sense. When you go on a 5-day "FMD" you're tricking your body into acting as though you're starving by eating less of only certain foods. This triggers some very helpful processes:
"FMD acts by breaking down and regenerating the insides of cells (autophagy) and killing off and replacing damaged cells (regeneration)."
Past trials (of which there have been many) have shown that even a 5-day FMD can begin processes that can last weeks and that repeating it several times over months can increase its efficiency. Once optimized, autophagy can act very quickly to recycle large amounts of cellular damage, while the production of stem cells increases, often dramatically. From his book:
"The streamlined cells, systems, and organs can be rebuilt by activating stem or progenitor cells and activating repair and replacement systems inside cells to cause regeneration - even while the body resumes normal feeding patterns."
This cycling between the "grow and go" mode and the "recycle and replace" mode is very powerful; it has deep roots in our evolutionary journey. Staying in either mode too long results in a stability not found in nature. FMD is becoming widely used for its effectiveness against cancer. It's also being adopted by a fast-growing number of dietitians to treat type 2 diabetes. There are even some indications from mouse studies that type 1 diabetes may be treatable in humans. A small trial of FMD for Alzheimer's went very well, and Dr. Longo is currently running a larger trial.
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