A pro-inflammatory diet is a stereotypical American diet, low on fruits and veggies, high on highly processed food, meat, refined grain, desserts and sugary drinks. An anti-inflammatory diet would be one that highlights vegetables, fruit, and, whole grains.
DR. AYALA LAUFER CAHANA: ‘Depression is a common and serious disorder, and while its causes are multiple and complex, diet may also play a role. Inflammation has been implicated in many diseases, depression among them. Inflammation is the body’s beneficial defense from injury and infection by invaders such as bacteria and viruses… There have been several studies that show improvement of depression symptoms when inflammation is controlled, either with drugs or with and an anti-inflammatory diet…
A new meta-analysis in Public Health Nutrition gathered the findings of four studies, including about 50,000 people, to see if the inflammatory potential of their diet is linked with developing depression… The researchers found that a pro-inflammatory diet was associated with a higher incidence of depression, and that people eating diets with the highest inflammatory score had a 23 percent higher risk of developing depression… Foods and nutrients with pro-inflammatory activity include total fat, saturated fat, trans-fat, protein, refined carbs and iron…
The personification of a pro-inflammatory diet is a stereotypical American diet – low on fruits and veggies, high on highly processed food, meat, refined grain, desserts and sugary drinks. The epitome of an anti-inflammatory diet would be a classic Mediterranean diet – a diet that highlights vegetables, fruit, spices and herbs, whole grains, garlic, onion, olive oil, fish and wine. Another way to look at it: A healthy diet – which happens to also score as a low inflammatory diet – might protect from depression and ease its symptoms’. SOURCE…
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