6 Popular Diet Fads Continues Part 2- The Blood Type Diet from Fitness Elements Express!

6 Popular Diet Fads and the Scientific Discovery behind them Part 2- The Blood Type Diet

The How to's on Designing your own Healthy Diet

Here is a quick look on some of the most popular Diets and what has been discovered with these various type diets. This will be a six part discussion and education for you on determining and forming your own personal view. While there are literally hundreds of fad diets that have been promoted over the years that we could discuss, we will limit the discussion to the following popular diets:

The Atkins diet
The Blood Type Diet
The Ornish diet
The Macrobiotic diet
The vegetarian diet
The Zone diet

Today we will start and discuss the Blood Type diet and what the outcomes and conclusions were. This is part two of the six part series of articles.

The Blood Type Diet

The Blood Type Diet is the culmination of nearly four decades of work conducted by Peter D'Adamo, N.D., and his father, James D' Adamo, N.D. It was popularized by the best-selling book by the younger D'Adamo, Eat Right 4 Your Blood Type. The principles of the Blood Type Diet are based on the theory that people with different blood types respond differently to specific foods. The concept is always based on evolutionary history and the observation that different blood types emerged as the environmental conditions and eating styles of our ancestors changed. Between 50,000 B.C.E. and 15,000 B.C.E as a necessary adaptation to a more agrarian lifestyle. Climatic changes in the western Himalayan mountains led to the appearance of type B, and the blending of type A and B blood types in modern civilization resulted in the appearance of the type AB blood type.

According to the Blood Type Diet, the physiological reason why people should eat according to their blood type relates to lectins, proteinlike substances found in many commonly eaten foods. Lectins, also known as phytoheagglutins, were first identified in 1888, at which time was discovered that lectins interact with sugar-containing molecules on the surface of cells. This discovery allowed certain lectins to be used in blood typing, since blood type is determined by the presence or absence of specific sugar-protein residues on the surface of red blood cells.

Although most of the lectins found in food are destroyed by cooking or digestive enzymes, Dr. D' Adamo believes that as many as 5 percent of the lectins we take in through our diet are absorbed into the bloodstream, and some of these our incompatible with our blood type. Many food antigen is eaten by a person with type A, type B, or type AB blood, the immune system recognizes that lectin as a foreign invader. Dr. D'Adamo implicates this lectin-caused immune response as the orgin of many common health complaints and believes that if you want to prevent health problems, it is important to eat foods that are compatible with your blood type.

To conclude my opinion of the Blood Type Diet along with my references is that blood type is just one genetic variable. In fact the ABO system is only one of the many different blood -typing methods, and to date more than thirty unique markers have been identified on the surface of red blood cells. In addition, one of the key suppositions of this diet is that dietary lectins are actually absorbed, but most of the research on, lectins has been performed in test tubes, not humans. Since many food lectins are destroyed by cooking , digestive enzymes, and bacteria in the intestines, it is not really known to what degree, if any, dietary lectins are absorbed. Nonetheless, there is some evidence to support the link between dietary lectins and some disease. All this being said their is some validity to the program but not all related to just blood typing alone.

Until part three the Ornish Diet have a healthy and happy day!

References: Michael Murray N.D., Joseph Pizzorno N.D., and Lara Pizzorno M.A., L.M.T

By, Natalie Pyles

NSA Speaker, Author, Medical Exercise and Post Rehab Conditioning Specialist, Licensed Nutritionist,Health, Fitness, and Holistic Nutrition and Nursing Educator