Tom Brady's diet might not be glamorous, but it's slowly winning over some New England Patriots teammates.

For example, take Rob Gronkowski. After watching the 39-year-old Brady play through the entire 2016 season without missing a game to injury -- Gronk missed eight games -- Gronkowski decided that he wanted to emulate Brady's lifestyle, so he could be as healthy as possible.

"Just looking at Tom, seeing what he does every day, what he eats, talking to him, personally one-on-one, just learning about the body with him, just seeing how flexible he is, how pliable he is, how loose he is all the time, every day and ready to go," Gronkowski said in arecent interview with the Boston Herald. "I just felt like it was the time in my career where I needed to devote myself at all levels,"

So what does that mean?

It means that Gronk has spent the past three months working with Brady's body coach (Alex Guerrero) and eating the same type of food that Brady eats.

Since Gronk's career started in 2010, Brady has missed zero games due to injury while Gronkowski has missed 24 out of 112 regular-season games. For Gronk, the hope is that by implementing Brady's way of life into his life, there will be less injuries down the road.

"I just felt like I had to add on to what I was doing. Find a way that my body will respond so I can perform every day. Be in prevention mode for injuries happening," Gronkowski said. "I definitely feel like a brand new guy just being able to do exercises here [at the TB12 center]."

Since most of Brady's meals are plant-based, it means that Gronk has had to mostly give up on meat, which seems to be working out for him so far, thanks in large part to Brady's cooking skills.

"Tom's my chef. I told him I'm only eating them if you have them ready for me," Gronkowski said. "And he said, 'Deal.'"

Brady might not be much of a cook, but we do know that he can make a mean beluga lentil taco, so I'm guessing that's what he eats with Gronk every night.

Although it seems that Gronk has been willing to mostly give up meat, there's one thing he hasn't necessarily been willing to give up: Alcohol.

Unlike Brady, who isn't really known to ever drink, Gronk still has the occasional adult beverage. Under Guerrero's watch, Gronk is allowed to drink alcohol, there's just one catch: He has to clean out his body afterward.

For every one drink of alcohol, Gronk is expected to drink three glasses of water to offset the damage he's doing to his body. The three glasses of water rule also applies if Gronk were to drink coffee.

So far, Guerrero has been impressed with his new client. "Rob has been really committed," Guerrero told the Herald. "He's done a great job. The foundation has been set. Certainly, we're not done."

If you want to eat like Brady, all you need to do is shell out $78 a week and joinhis at-home food delivery service. If $78 is too steep of a price for you, then you can buy something cheaper: Bradyalso sells a $50 bag of nuts.

I'm not sure if $50 is a good price for nuts, but it must be, because those things always seem to sell out just seconds after they get more stock.

Finally, if you're looking to embrace the entire Brady diet and you have $200 to spare, youcan buy his cookbook, which isn't actually a cookbook, because it's a "Nutrition manual," according to Brady. If you follow Brady's diet plan, there's no guarantee that you'll also marry a supermodel and win five Super Bowls, but it seems like it could be worth a try.

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Rob Gronkowski is trying Tom Brady's diet plan, but skipping one key part - CBSSports.com

The Mediterranean diet can reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, yet only people with higher incomes or more education, or a combination of the two, experience this benefit, found a study published Monday in the International Journal of Epidemiology.

The Mediterranean diet emphasizes eating plant-based foods, including vegetables, nuts, fruits and whole grains, in addition to fish and poultry. The diet also recommends that you limit red meat, replace butter with olive oil, and exercise. Red wine in moderation is optional on the diet, which past scientific research proves to be heart-healthy.

Marialaura Bonaccio, lead author of the new study and a researcher at IRCCS Istituto Neurologico Mediterraneo Neuromed, an Italian Clinical Research Institute, said in an email that this same problem in which people from different income levels get different results from the same diet may also be true for other diets.

The reason? Diets focus on quantity, rather than on quality of the food, she said.

Diet data

Bonaccio and her co-authors randomly recruited over 18,000 people living in the Molise region of southern Italy between March 2005 and April 2010. The Pfizer Foundation, which helped fund enrollment costs, did not influence the analysis or interpretation of results, Bonaccio noted.

She and her team calculated total physical activity, body mass index (BMI), smoking status and health history, including cardiovascular disease, diabetes and cancer. The data available for each participant also included education, household income and marital status.

Using the Mediterranean Diet Score, Bonaccio and her colleagues assessed participants food intake, examining the variety of fruits and vegetables, meat and fish consumed. They scored participants cooking methods, detailing whether theyre using healthy methods such as boiling and stewing or less healthy methods such as frying, roasting and grilling. Vegetables were categorized as organic or not, bread as whole-grain or not.

Over an average followup period of about four years, participants experienced a total of 5,256 cardiovascular disease events, including incidents of heart failure, diagnoses of coronary heart disease (a buildup of plaque in the arteries) and strokes.

Analyzing the data, the researchers found that a Mediterranean diet effectively reduced cardiovascular disease risk, but only among a select group of participants: those with higher income or more education.

We found heart advantages were limited to high socioeconomic status groups, even if groups showed the same adherence to the Mediterranean diet, Bonaccio wrote. No benefits occurred for participants in the low income and low education group.

Differences in food quality

Surprised by this result, the researchers dug into the data more deeply and unearthed a possible reason for the difference: The same Mediterranean diet adherence score still included slight differences in food consumption.

For example, as compared to less advantaged counterparts, people with high socioeconomic status tended to consume fish more frequently, Bonaccio wrote. She added that, beyond diet adherence, participants in the most advantaged category reported a higher quality diet, which included higher consumption of organic products and whole grain foods.

Lets give that two persons follow the same diet, that is equal amounts of vegetables, fruits, fish, olive oil etc. every day so that they report the same adherence score to Mediterranean diet, Bonaccio said. It might be that, beyond quantity, differences in quality may exist. For example, in olive oil.

She said its unlikely that a bottle of extra virgin olive oil with a price tag of 2 to 3 euros has the same nutritional properties as one costing 10 euros. Given that it is reasonable to assume higher-income participants are more likely to buy the 10-euro bottle compared with lower-income participants, our hypothesis is that differences in the price may yield differences in healthy components and future health outcomes, Bonaccio said.

How the food is cooked or prepared might also contribute to differences in results, according to Bonaccio, though she said the differences in cooking procedures a kind of marker of the numerous differences still persisting across socioeconomic groups probably did not substantially account for the disparities in cardiovascular risk.

Similar results in US?

Mercedes Sotos-Prieto, an assistant professor and visiting scientist at Harvard Chan School of Public Health, said evidence, including from her own research, shows that a Mediterranean diet is one of the best choices to improve health.

Sotos-Prieto, who was not involved in the new research, wrote in an email that the new study, which relied on self-reported data, does not prove that socioeconomic status caused the health benefits seen; it shows only a relationship between income and/or education and health outcomes.

Previous studies have already showed a socioeconomic gradient regarding adherence to diet quality, Sotos-Prieto wrote. Because of this, a similar difference in health results depending on socioeconomic status may also be occurring in the United States among those who follow a Mediterranean diet, she said.

Dr. Barbara Berkeley, who specializes in weight management and practices medicine in Beachwood, Ohio, said one caveat in interpreting studies like this is that they are based on diet recall. It is generally very difficult for people to keep accurate food records and there is a tendency for participants to record their diets in the best possible light.

Berkeley, who was not involved in this research, agreed with the hypothesis of the authors.

A good diet is undoubtedly more than just a shopping list, she said. Quality, freshness, variety and purity of production may truly differentiate diets even when they appear to be the same.

Berkeley noted that food deserts in lower-income areas means both quality and variety of fresh foods may be limited, while organic produce may be unavailable or too expensive.

A healthy diet is likely not the sum of its parts but the quality of its elements, Berkeley said.

Maria Korre, a research fellow at Harvard Chan School of Public Health, noted that among the most important perceived barriers to healthy eating are the time and cost of shopping. Korre, who did not contribute to the new study, added that we need to work toward identifying ways to overcome these barriers.

As a result of the worldwide epidemics of obesity and diabetes, we witness a strong and renewed interest in the traditional Mediterranean diet, Korre said. Yet the appeal of this diet extends well beyond proven health benefits.

With its wide range of colorful foods, the diet provides delicious meals and because of its emphasis on limited consumption, rather than abstention from red meat and sweets plus its inclusion of moderate drinking of alcoholic beverages, the Mediterranean diet represents a healthy yet indulgent and appealing lifestyle that can be sustained over long periods of time, Korre said.

According to the study authors, people of high socioeconomic status may actually be selecting foods that are higher in both polyphenols (plant-based micronutrients) and antioxidants (a nutrient found in fruits and vegetables that helps repair damage in our bodies). Such daily choices could result in health advantages unseen by those who make different selections.

This hypothesis could be only tested by a direct measure of such natural compounds in biological samples, e.g., blood levels or urinary polyphenol excretion, Bonaccio said. She said her groups future research and analysis will test this theory.

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The Mediterranean diet doesn't benefit everyone, study says - wtvr.com

You may think all beverages are equally bad on a plane, but it turns out one type of drink is extra irksome to your cabin crew.

Diet Coke is difficult to pour in the sky because it foams up more than non-diet drinks, according to a recent post on the flight attendant blog These Gold Wings.

We checked with otherflight attendants,who confirmed the struggle is real. Among them was Heather Poole, an American Airlines flight attendant who wrote about the phenomenon in a 2012 article for Mental Floss.

[Diet Coke is] the most annoying beverage a flight attendant can pour for a passenger in flight, because in the time it takes us to fill one cup, we could have served an entire row of passengers, Poole wrote. Ive actually had nightmares about frantically trying to finish a never ending Diet Coke beverage service before landing.

Pouring the drink is such a struggle that These Gold Wings demonstrated a smart way to avoid all the fizz in a 2013 video:

Many soda fansnoteDiet Coke is fizzier than regular Cokeeven on the ground, theorizing that its lack of sugar makes for a less viscous liquid, allowing bubbles to last longer before popping.

A Coke spokeswoman declined to share scientific specifics with HuffPost, but hinted that Diet Cokes ingredients could be the cause of its extra bubbles. Pouring the drink over ice only increases fizziness.

The amount of bubbles across different sparkling beverages is related to the specific recipe versus the altitude in which they are poured, the spokesperson told HuffPost. Generally, when sparkling beverages are poured at room temperature from a can and over ice, the fizz is increased.

According toSouthwest Airlinesflight attendant Stephanie Mikel, the effect occurs in all diet drinks.

Any diet or zero calorie soda fizzes more than the regular kind, she told HuffPost. But obviously, if its something someone wants, I would never get upset over that. You learn quickly which [sodas]you need to pour from a high angle and slowly.

Some airlines hand out entire cans of soda, Jay Robert of Fly Guy noted (andyou might even score one on a non-can airline, if you ask nicely.) With luck, youll be able to experience this phenomenon for yourself!

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If You Love Your Flight Attendant, Do Not Order Diet Coke - HuffPost

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) Multiple Sclerosis affects about 400,000 people in the United States, and current treatments can have severe side effects.

But what if changing your diet could help battle the disease?

As CBS2s Dr. Max Gomez reports, thats just what researchers at Mt. Sinai are testing.

Once a month, a pioneering group of MS patients meet to get tips from a nutritionist, and also share their temptations.

Neurologist Dr. Ilana Katz Sand is leading one of the first clinical trials to study the link between what we eat, gut bacteria, and MS symptoms.

The gut is actually kind of a natural place to look, and thats because the immune system about 70 percent of it lives inside the gut and has far reaching implications throughout the rest of the body, Dr. Katz Sand said.

In MS, inflammation occurs when the immune cells attack the brain and spinal cord.

The study is testing whether a dietary intervention can reprogram the immune system to slow down the assault on the nervous system.

Kerane Providence, and the other patients enrolled in the trial, are following a strict Mediterranean style diet, devoid of any processed foods, dairy, or meat. Rather, the diet calls for heavy doses of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains.

We think that those are anti-inflammatory, we also think that theyre neuroprotective, Dr. Katz Sand said.

MS symptoms including fatigue, difficulty walking, vision problems, and cognitive changes can be severe and disabling.

I was really fearful because I have a family, I have my children, I have my husband, Kerane said.

But with the help of medication,she is still able to work nights as an oncology nurse, more than four years after her diagnosis.

If I can participate in a diet that can change my life, give me longevity, Kerane said.

While sticking to the diet can be a little tough, the volunteers like it even if it doesnt do much for their MS it also happens to be very heart healthy, with some patients already reporting to have more energy.

The first study is small, with about 30 patients, and it will be six months before researchers know if the diet has any measurable impact on MS symptoms.

Excerpt from:
Research Suggests Mediterranean Diet May Help Battle Multiple Sclerosis - CBS New York

Hoping you won't order a Diet Coke.withGod/Shutterstock

There are plenty of things passengers can do to drive flight attendants crazy, although ordering a certain diet soda might be an inconvenience you've never thought about.

Diet Coke's carbonation makes it hard to pour without overflowing the cup with bubbles. As a result, it takes flight attendants significantly longer to pour Diet Coke than other beverages, including other sodas.

"Of all the drinks we serve, Diet Coke takes the most time to pour the fizz takes forever to settle at 35,000 feet. In the time it takes me to pour a single cup of Diet Coke, I can serve three passengers a different beverage," Heather Poole, a flight attendant, wrote on her blog.

The reason why Diet Coke takes so long to pour can partly be attributed to its ingredients, which make it more carbonated than non-diet sodas, according to the HuffPost.

There is, however, a way around the inconvenience of pouring Diet Coke, according to another flight attendant blog, These Gold Wings.

While your flight attendant might not be thrilled about taking extra time to pour your Diet Coke, that won't stop them from serving the particularly fizzy beverage.

"For the record, I drink Diet Coke both as a flight attendant and as a passenger," Poole wrote.

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Ordering a Diet Coke is the worst thing you can do to your flight attendant here's why - INSIDER

Co-written with Holly McGarr, BSc Dietetics (candidate)

Fasting has been used for health and religious reasons for hundreds of years, and due to an explosion of new interest from media, intermittent fasting is becoming the newest trend in dieting. But is there any supporting scientific evidence that would make it anything more than another weight-loss fad? Does intermittent fasting work and hold up to their claims?

Tatomm via Getty Images

There are three types of intermittent fasting (IF) diets: alternate-day fasting, whole day fasting and time-restricted feeding. Alternate-day fasting involves alternating between fasting days and days of eating until satisfied. Whole-day fasting involves one to two days of complete fasting per week and eating until satisfied the other days. Time-restricted feeding involves the same eating routine each day, using a certain number of hours designated as a fasting window and the remaining as the feeding window. Time restricted feeding is becoming the most popular type of IF diet in the health and fitness industry, and often with promises of amazing (albeit unrealistic) results.

Currently, one of the most popular reasons for following this kind of diet is for its claimed aid in weight loss. It is important to keep in mind that no diet has ever shown long-term success with weight loss (longer than two years), but hey maybe this one is unique, like all the other one-of-a-kind diets out there, right?

According to the current research, IF diets work for weight-loss just as well as any other traditional caloric restriction diets which is VERY POORLY. In a review of 12 independent studies comparing the effectiveness of intermittent fasting to continuous restricted eating, nine of the 12 studies concluded no significant differences between the groups. Overall, there is very limited evidence suggesting IF diets to be superior.

It is well documented that the body undergoes adaptive responses (both physical and mental) to calorie restriction that can slow down and reverse weight loss when dieting. For example, these changes include increased appetite, reduced energy expenditure, and hormonal changes that promote the accumulation of fat tissue and the loss of lean muscle tissue. A major reason that IF is believed to be effective is based on the idea that alternating periods of energy balance used in IF could reduce these adaptive responses and therefore increase the efficiency of weight loss.

Interesting idea, but what does the research say? Overall, there is no evidence that suggests IF reduces the adaptive effect of decreased energy expenditure from calorie restriction relative to the effects of continuous restriction diets. There are currently three studies that directly compare energy expenditure of IF to continuous restriction diets. Overall, they have not shown intermittent fasting protocols reduce the adaptive responses to energy restriction relative to the effects of continuous restriction diets.

Getty Images/iStockphoto

Some claim that IF diet will help to improve cardiometabolic health and diseases such as diabetes, high blood pressure, insulin resistance and high cholesterol. However, any evidence of improvements is quite lacking. It is important to note that many of the studies looking at changes in risk for cardiometabolic diseases compare low-calorie diets to IF. One meta analysis that conducted this sort of comparison did not show any difference in cardiometabolic health markers such as cholesterol, blood glucose, and A1C levels. Another study, published in JAMA, also found no difference in these health indicators (such as blood pressure, blood glucose, insulin resistance and CRP).

There is still a lot of research needed on intermittent fasting to fully understand the potential benefits and risks of this type of diet. For now, the evidence does not justify using this type of method for weight loss (or any other method or diet for long-term weight change) nor for cardiometabolic health. This type of diet is extremely difficult to follow in an everyday setting for any length of time, as all diets are.

Non-diet approaches to health and wellness, such as mindful and intuitive eating, are more effective long term and reduce the chances of developing an unhealthy relationship with food and your body. There are many reasons for this- but perhaps the most compelling is the fact that without an answer for long term weight loss, weight cycling (or yoyoing) occurs in up to 95 per cent of people which leads to poorer physical and mental health. As the authors of this very in-depth article state "Much research suggests damage results from a weight-centered focus, such as weight cycling and stigmatization."

Does intermittent fasting work for weight loss or improve cardiometabolic health? According to current evidence, no. However, there are answers to our health problems if we allow ourselves to step away from weight loss-centric nutrition advice and focus on actual health.

For more information on better alternatives to intermittent fasting for health and well-being, check out Lisa's blog at http://www.LisaRutledge.ca

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Will Intermittent Fasting Be The Fad Diet That Finally Works? - Huffington Post Canada

Organizers of Camp DASH were not new to hosting adolescents for several weeks on campus while they studied the effects of dietary changes on their bodies.

Camp DASH was the focus of much news coverage last week after the camp ended two weeks early because of disciplinary issues among its young campers.

Connie Weaver, the Purdue nutrition professor whose career has been lauded for the lingering effects of her research over the years, ran the similar Camp Calcium for decades.

The University has pledged to investigate what happened with Camp DASH and has not yet released details of what organizers knew when about the police incidents that included instances of alleged rape, aggravated assaults and what was purportedly a nude video of a camper circulated to other campers.

So what was different about Camp Calcium, widely lauded for its research into the effects of calcium on growing bodies, and Camp DASH, which sought to measure the effects of salt in the diets of 11- to 15-year-olds in the upper third of distribution of blood pressure?

Some answers might be found in the descriptions found online of the research and clinical trials of the two camps.

The goals of Camp DASH were outlined in ClinicalTrials.gov, a U.S. National Institutes of Health website. The study was set to run from October 2016 to August 2020.

It was designed to measure the effects of four levels of sodium in two 25-day feeding interventions with a weeklong break between the sessions. The lower-sodium diets would consist of fruits, vegetables and low-fat dairy foods. The higher-sodium diets would include foods that provide the majority of energy for adolescents in the U.S., i.e. grain-based desserts, pizza, sugary drinks, pasta, chicken and chicken mixed dishes.

Purdue described Camp DASH online in an Information for Campers page, saying campers would spend one half eating one diet and then switch to another the second half.

In an Exponent article from December, Weaver said some children attend her camps looking for adult stability, and shes giving her time and attention to kids who need it. My work is also my philanthropy, she said.

Camp DASH would attract 150 campers, according to the December article.

Two counselors told The Exponent last week that about 100 kids participated this summer.

But according to online Camp Calcium Databases from 1990, when the camp began, through 2010, the largest of those camps involved 70 children. The Camp Calcium studies varied slightly in the specific calcium research question and the ethnicities and other characteristics of the participants.

A university spokesman has not responded to an inquiry about whether Camp Calcium was held after 2010, and if so, how many campers were included.

According to the databases, these are the children studied in Camp Calcium:

1990: 14 girls and 11 female adults

1993: 26 teen girls with 6 returning from Camp 1

1996: 16 girls returned from Camp 2

1997: 19 black girls

1999, 2000: 34 and 63 teens, respectively

2001: 37 teen boys

2004: 42 boys and girls

2005: 31 boys and girls

2007: 47 girls

2010: 70 boys and girls

Purdue issued a news release Friday stating President Mitch Daniels has appointed the Universitys vice president for ethics and compliance to lead an institutional review and assessment of issues and decisions related to Camp DASH.

The release said that after the first session, the program was fully assessed by campus officials, resulting in a decision to conduct the second session, contingent upon the implementation of an intervention plan, which included the hiring of an adolescent behavior specialist, increased training for counselors and directing the continued immediate reporting of illegal behaviors.

Seven campers were expelled during the first session, the news release said.

Police calls show that some of the most egregious allegations, particularly in the second session, were not reported until days after they happened.

In addition to the police and internal investigations, research protocols are being assessed through Purdues Human Research Protection Program.

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Camp DASH apparently involved more campers than previous camps - Purdue Exponent