It would be interesting to contrast people in cultures which eat a non-adherent diet normally, yet have far less CAD than these folks have.
A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
11–20 of 65 posts
Re: A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
#12It doesn't look like they had a control group, did they?
I'm not trying to quibble, but am genuinely curious: What would a control group consist of? There were plenty of patients who didn't receive the trial program, at large in the general population. And it couldn't have been a blind study, because the patients knew what they were eating.
Re: A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
#13"Results: Of the 198 patients with CVD, 177 (89%) were adherent. Major cardiac events judged to be recurrent disease totaled one stroke in the adherent cardiovascular participants—a recurrent event rate of .6%, significantly less than reported by other studies of plant-based nutrition therapy. Thirteen of 21 (62%) nonadherent participants experienced adverse events."
.6% of 177 people is 1 person.
Re: A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
#14What was the rationale for excluding oils, nuts and avocados from the diet?
Re: A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
#15This is a pretty ground-breaking study, and do hope it gets much wider coverage in mainstream media. I had earlier read the book by the lead author of this study Dr. Esselstyn, "Prevent and reverse heart disease", which describes the plant-based diet approach and research done earlier that was effective with a group of 22 patients with terminal heart disease. Also, recommend reading related work on diet-based approaches by Dean Ornish. Ornish's approach does allow the use of some diary, eggs, and some amount of oil.
The documentary "Forks over knives" - available on Netflix, describes this approach and has features interviews with Esselstyn as well.
More useful links:
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caldwell_Esselstyn [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_China_Study
Re: A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
#16It doesn't look like they had a control group, did they?
Nope, and no blinding either. This should be considered a preliminary study at best. The quantity of participants doesn't make much of a difference without proper scientific controls.
Re: A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
#17It doesn't look like they had a control group, did they?
Not exactly a control group, but among the group of 22 patients who did not follow the diet, 13 or 62% had some sort of adverse event (stroke/heart-attack etc), compared with just 1 out of the group of 177 (0.6%) who did follow the diet. That seems to be pretty compelling evidence that the approach is effective.
Re: A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
#18While interesting this is a highly flawed study. It should be considered preliminary with more properly controlled followup studies.
1. No control group
You need to have a control group that continues eating a standard healthy diet that includes animal products. The 11% who were non-adherent could have been eating unhealthy diets which contributed to their instances of CAD. Without a control it could have just been eating a healthy diet that helped, not the exclusion of animal products.
2. No blinding
Of course a food consumption study is nearly impossible to double blind but at the very least the researchers could have been blinded. This also requires a control group.
3. Self-reported data
While it's very tough to get anything other than self-reported data for long term food consumption, it makes it far more likely that the participants will report inaccurate or incorrect data. Results tend to be biased because participants don't want to let researchers down and lie about adherence.
Re: A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
#19What was the rationale for excluding oils, nuts and avocados from the diet?
They're high in fats, compared to other plants.
Re: A Way to Reverse Coronary Artery Disease? [pdf]
#20It doesn't look like they had a control group, did they?
I'm not trying to quibble, but am genuinely curious: What would a control group consist of? There were plenty of patients who didn't receive the trial program, at large in the general population. And it couldn't have been a blind study, because the patients knew what they were eating.
A control group goes through the same amount of attention and procedure as the experimental group, controlling for as many independent variables as possible. "Someone in a lab coat is watching my diet" all by itself is probably a pretty strong motivator for change, and one that the general public does not have. What people eat when they think someone's watching can be markedly different to what they'd eat in private.