OT: Are Carefully-supplemented Vegan Diets Perfectly Healthy?

Billybob,
I don't have Dave's last numbers but know they were all pretty good. He has never had cholesterol problems even when on his fatty, dairy diet but his scores in that area have improved now over what they were prior to changing his diet. His only problem has been low vitamin D and they are also monitoring his blood platelets. He said that his blood work began to show small improvements from the first several months into the diet. His B12, however, was low so he is taking supplements. He still eats fish a few times a week and I doubt he'll give that up.
Chris

chrisp1 said...
Billybob,
I don't have Dave's last numbers but know they were all pretty good. He has never had cholesterol problems even when on his fatty, dairy diet but his scores in that area have improved now over what they were prior to changing his diet. His only problem has been low vitamin D and they are also monitoring his blood platelets. He said that his blood work began to show small improvements from the first several months into the diet. His B12, however, was low so he is taking supplements. He still eats fish a few times a week and I doubt he'll give that up.
Chris

I'm not sure I blame him! Look at Cashless' numbers, he eats seafood! And hey, they make a cheap supplement for that Vitamin D issue, especilly if you are already blood testing.

I agree with Dr Greger that choline in meat, especially eggs and chicken are potentially very harmful to those with prostate cancer. I personally have switched to whole grain plant-based...mostly. After researching cancer nutrition, I will never eat commercially produced meat again, but still do eat sockeye salmon (its never farm raised). I figure if Jesus can feed 5000 with fish, who am I to question the creator of the universe.

cashlessclay said...
Billybob says: "Very impressive indeed, Cashless. Makes me think it is
not so much the Vegan thing as it is something else, like maybe low carb.


Billybob, I do not pay attention to percentage of carbs, fats, and protein.

Instead, I follow:

* insulin response (keep it low)
* iron content (keep it low)
* fatty acid content (arachidonic and linoleic acids, keep them low)
* soy content (some soy almost everyday).

Dreamerboy is correct, "vegan" is a poor description of a diet. I have
very little fast carbs like sugars, bread, white rice, pasta, potatoes, and
have very little fruit.

Cashless

You may not pay attention to the % of carbs/fat/protein, but I think you are none the less eating low net carb. ( which might be very similar to what you call "fast carb". ) The high fiber carbs ( mainly vegetables, but some fruits to some degree ) end up also being low net carb, low digestible carb. These are also relatively very slow to raise blood sugar and hence blood insulin. In my experience at least, and or from what I have read over the years, low insulin = low NET carb. And low triglycerides = low net carb. And both of those can also be related to adequate fat, as fat slows digestion and absorption of whatever the net carb load is, leading to slower blood sugar rise and peaks, hence lower peak insulin. ( net carb being = to total carb minus indigestible fiber)

I know you do not pay attention to it, but I will still bet a $ that if you were to add it up, your normal/average day would be pretty low net carb, leading to low blood insulin. And it appears blood insulin has a major impact on growth of cancer cells, including PCa cells.

But, just my 2 cents, and as always I could be wrong. Whatever you are doing, it sure seems to be working for you! I need to do more like what you do!

EDIT: about insulin: I started another thread, which has not had a single response- apparently a very uninteresting subject- where I copied a few studies that seemed to show a quite dramatic association between insulin and PCa. when I say dramatic, I mean 3 or five or even 8 times the risk or odds of PC when comparing the highest insulin guys to the lowest. Seems like there might be something there, but few seem to be paying it much attention. Even more interesting to me: they are not even looking at attempts to cut blood insulin way down low. They are just looking at a group- which would presumably include very few on low carb diets- a group of people just eating whatever they eat on average a a group- then looking at blood insulin. So most likely there are very few who were actually trying to lower blood insulin, so the lowest insulin group is probably not even all that low, compared to someone actively trying to lower it. Still, the associations were 3 to 8 times higher comparing lowest insulin to highest. Also, there seemed to be some evidence of a stronger association with the higher risk folks. So if you are trying to keep insulin low, you sure seem to be on the right path. No wonder you are getting good results.