The Doctor's Diet: Dr. Travis Stork's STAT Program to Help You Lose Weight & Restore Your Health (49 page)

Chronic inflammation has been linked to a wide range of diseases, including heart disease, stroke, cancer, diabetes, arthritis, and Alzheimer’s. Pretty much all of the major killers in our society. Genetic factors also seem to play a part in inflammation.

In the case of heart disease, when the body perceives injuries to the heart’s blood vessels caused in the way of high blood pressure, excess LDL cholesterol, and the buildup of plaque in blood vessels, it tries to heal itself by mounting an inflammatory response. Sadly, that response does more harm than good.

There are lots of reasons why inflammation makes the jump from healing to hurting. The ones we’re most concerned with in this book are the ones related to weight and food.

Eating a pro-inflammatory diet and having excess body weight and body fat are some of the major causes of chronic inflammation. That’s because your body thinks of excess fat and unhealthy food as threats to your health.

Yes, you read that right: your body considers body fat and certain foods to be as dangerous as viruses, bacteria, and injuries, so it turns up its inflammatory response to a nonstop simmer in an effort to protect you from your own choices.

Fortunately, by improving your diet and losing excess fat, you can turn the heat down on inflammation. In doing so, you lower your risk of developing the many diseases associated with chronic inflammation—the very diseases that so often cause premature death and disability.

The Doctor’s Diet is, at its core, an anti-inflammatory eating plan because it steers you away from pro-inflammatory foods and includes so
many fantastic anti-inflammatory choices. Follow it and you’ll not only reduce the causes of chronic inflammation, but you’ll lower your risk of heart disease, diabetes, and other inflammation-related diseases as well.

The Doctor’s Diet focuses on five ways to cool chronic inflammation.

Excess weight sends out a red-alarm inflammatory alert in your body, and losing weight can help cool things down. Research shows that dropping even a small number of pounds can make a dramatic difference in inflammation levels.

In a 2012 study of overweight and obese women, researchers discovered that those who lost at least 5 percent of their body weight saw significant reductions in inflammation. After one year, those who lost weight through diet and exercise had a 41.7 percent reduction in C-reactive protein and a 24.3 percent cut in interleukin-6, two inflammatory markers that can be measured with blood tests. The study was published in the journal
Cancer Research
.

As you lose weight, your body’s inflammation levels should start going down.

Certain foods spark an inflammatory response, so it’s best to avoid them or scale back on them. You’ll find them in very limited amounts in The Doctor’s Diet. They include:

Highly processed carbohydrates—especially “white” foods such as white bread, sugary cereals, flour tortillas, and white rice

Sugar-sweetened beverages, such as sodas, sweetened iced tea, fruit punches, and sports drinks

Fast food, junk food, and deep-fried food

Foods that contain trans fats (shortening, partially hydrogenated oils, most margarines, commercially made cakes and pastries)

A variety of super-healthy foods help lower inflammation. That’s why I’ve made them a major part of the Doctor’s Diet. Most of the recommendations in my Food Prescriptions lower inflammation—that’s one of the reasons I love these foods so much:

Vegetables, especially those that are dark green, red, orange, and yellow. Like fruits, vegetables are a great source of phytochemicals, which are antioxidants that help your body in more ways than food scientists can count.

Fruits, especially berries, which are relatively low in sugar and very high in antioxidants.

High-fiber foods, such as whole grains (oats, quinoa, whole-grain breads) and legumes