We wrote previously about ultraprocessed foods, referring to them as the "highway to Alzheimer's disease." Some estimate that 73% of the American food supply is composed of ultraprocessed foods. I'm thinking that, putting together my many-year history of living off of ultraprocessed foods and my history of shingles infections, perhaps there is an explanation for my disease. But who knows.
In any event, I came across this article about some research on the effects of living on ultraprocessed foods. The article references research published in the journal Cell Metabolism in 2019. The researchers worked with one cohort of subjects living on ultraprocessed foods and another living for the same period on unprocessed foods. The upshot of their finding was that, over the period of a month of living under controlled conditions, the people consuming ultraprocessed foods gained an average of two pounds, while those living on unprocessed foods lost an average of two pounds.
Those results don't say much about the influence on brain health, but in her book Diet for the Mind, the late Dr. Martha Clare Morris rounds up other research making the connections. Ultraprocessed foods are bad for your brain. But they taste so good...
Some commentators provide guidance that the unprocessed foods are on the outer perimeter of what's in you're supermarket, and the processed and ultraprocessed foods are on the interior. That's consistent with my observation.
We've listed examples of ultraprocessed foods before, but here's the list we've used in the past:
Carbonated soft drinks
Sweet, fatty, or salty packaged snacks
Candies (confectionery)
Mass-produced packaged breads and buns
Cookies (biscuits)
Pastries
Cakes and cake mixes
Margarine and other spreads
Sweetened breakfast cereals
Sweetened fruit yogurt and energy drinks
Powdered and packaged instant soups, noodles, and desserts
Pre-prepared meat, cheese, pasta, and pizza dishes
Poultry and fish nuggets and sticks
Sausages, hamburgers, hot dogs, and other reconstituted meat products
My name is Carl A Dixon. I am the Senior Pastor in a Church in Sarasota Florida - Calvary Chapel of Sarasota. I have read your Dementia Monster book and recommended it to others. I have several friends who are having cognitive problems (myself included) and your writings have helped greatly. I am always searching out possibilities regarding dealing with cognitive problems - the most common is exercise which at 77 I do daily along with a proper diet - but I have been told that a product called FAST BRAIN BOOSTER actually works and helps people with such problems. I have checked out many such statements and considered them either entirely false and very deceptive. But this product has many positive reviews that I don't know if I can trust or not. Can you suggest any way for me to discover reviews on this product that would
ReplyDeletebe from trustworthy sources? I don't want to have any of my friends wasting their money on a scheme just because there is an MD recommending it? My email is - pastorcarldixon@gmail.com.