LATITUDE WITHIN AN NCEP STEP I DIET--AN OPTIMAL DIET

Stanford University, Stanford CA

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Abstract

This nutrition study was intended to contrast two different approaches to selecting a low-fat diet. One diet was a relatively typical American low-fat diet (n=61). The other incorporated considerably more vegetables, legumes, and whole grains (n=59), with modest amounts of butter, cheese and egg added so that both diets had the same amount of saturated fat and cholesterol. Participants were adults with moderately elevated cholesterol levels, but with no history of heart disease. After assigning the participants to either one group or the other and then providing them with all of their meals for four weeks, cholesterol levels and other heart disease risk factors were examined. The diet with more plant foods was found to be more effective than the "typical" diet at lowering levels of LDL-cholesterol, even though both had the same levels of fat and cholesterol.