‘Think of nutrition as a prescription:’ Vail Health experts share secrets behind healthy eating
Ultraprocessed foods, often a staple of American diet, linked to cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes, dementia
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Vail Health on Thursday, April 3, hosted a panel of three health care experts who use their knowledge of nutrition to support the health of their patients.
“I like to think of nutrition as a prescription,” said Dr. Susie Vickerman, a family medicine physician at Colorado Mountain Medical.
While medication can treat diabetes, high blood pressure or heart conditions, for many patients, proper nutrition can prevent the conditions from ever developing.
“Nutrition is the foundation of our overall health well-being,” Vickerman said.
Conditions like cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes and dementia are all influenced by diet. “You can impact your fate by changing your nutrition,” Vickerman said.
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But in her more than 25 years at Colorado Mountain Medical, Vickerman said she has found that it is challenging to get patients to take nutrition as seriously as they do medication.
“If society as a whole placed the importance on nutrition the same way they do on medication, we would have a whole lot less chronic disease,” Vickerman said.
When she discusses nutrition with her patients, Vickerman encourages them to think of it as a lifestyle, not a diet. She recommends that people develop a nutritional vision to support their decisions and make small, realistic changes that work for their families and will last.
What to eat
The foundations of a healthy diet come from protein, vegetables and carbohydrates, as minimally processed as possible.
Lilia Brown, a functional medicine nurse practitioner at Vail Health with a specialty in healthspan, broke down the nutritional value of each part of a healthy diet.
“What we eat can either fuel or fight inflammation,” she said.
Protein “is literally used in every part of our body,” Brown said.
As people age, they start to lose muscle, and eating enough protein can help battle that loss. Protein can come from animal sources, like lean meat, or plant sources, including legumes and soy products. Most people should aim to eat one gram of protein per kilogram of their body weight, which comes out to about 20-30 grams of protein per meal.
But not all protein sources are equally nutritious. Processed and factory farmed meats like sausages, hot dogs and deli meat contain a lot of hormones and salt, which promote inflammation in bodies, Brown said, while some plant sources of protein lack some amino acids, which blocks the body from using the protein.
People should aim to eat a combination of unprocessed plant and animal protein sources, and, when eating vegetarian, to combine a grain or a bean with a leafy green to maximize the plant protein.
“Carbohydrates are your body’s main source of energy,” Brown said. “Not all carbs are created equal, though.”
Carbohydrates consumed in excess can be stored as fat and can spike blood pressure and lead to insulin resistance.
Healthy carbohydrates include whole grains, legumes, beans, quinoa, wild rice, oats, flax and all colors of fruits and vegetables.
Though rumors have surrounded soy for years that the vegetarian protein source, derived from soybeans, has estrogen-like properties, the food is not only safe, but recommended for consumption.
“The evidence is strong that soy is very healthy,” said Melanie Hendershott, a registered dietitian at the Shaw Cancer Center. “It has been shown that including whole soy foods in your diet reduces risk of recurrence (of breast cancer), and so the current recommendation for breast cancer survivors is to have one to two servings of soy per day. For the rest of us, certainly including soy in your diet in a whole food form is shown to reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease, combat prostate cancer, it’s just fine.”
Fats are essential for hormone regulation and brain function. The problem, Brown said, is that a lot of the fats Americans eat are unhealthy. People should aim to consume monounsaturated fat from nuts, seeds, olive oil and omega-3 fatty acids from chia seeds, flax seeds and salmon.
Saturated fats, which come from meat and dairy products, should be limited. Trans fats, which are used to extend the life of food, cause a lot of inflammation, can lead to heart problems and should be avoided.
Brown also often recommends that her patients take three supplements. But “not every supplement was created equal,” she said. People should check the label for “Current Good Manufacturing Practice, or CGMP, which means the supplements have been deemed safe by third party testing.
Omega-3 fatty acids, often taken in the supplement form of fish oil, help with inflammation and joint pain.
Vitamin D3 and vitamin K2 are essential for bone health and combating inflammation.
While humans can make Vitamin D by absorbing sunlight through their skin, the latitude, altitude and the seasons in Eagle County limit the amount of vitamin D locals can make. Some people may manage to intake enough through their diet — vitamin D is found in egg yolks, mushrooms and fatty fish — but “typically, most people can’t get enough Vitamin D in their diets,” Brown said.
“It’s a good one to test with your doctor,” Brown said.
Brown also recommends people take probiotic and prebiotic supplements — the combined version is called synbiotics — to support gut health.
How to build a meal
Vickerman urged those feeding families to be realistic about what will work for their family and avoid making a separate meal for themselves.
“It’s hard enough to make one quality meal, let alone more than one quality meal,” Vickerman said.
Grocery shopping is an easy way to control what’s in the house.
“We are responsible for the food that we give our kids. If you don’t offer pasta and you don’t offer mac and cheese, they won’t eat it,” Vickerman said. If families are already offering those items, it just takes a couple of weeks of tantrums to turn the tide.
Hendershott encouraged people to write a meal plan each week and put together a grocery list to create the meals, beginning with the ingredients they already have in the house.
Vickerman suggested that people think of their nutrition over the course of a week. If a day does not go well nutritionally, they can make up for it on other days.
The panel fielded questions from the audience on topics including food addiction and fasting windows.
Ultraprocessed foods “are made to taste extra yummy. Extra salty, extra crispy,” Brown said. When people eat these foods, “our brain … is not hearing that is hurting our body.”
UItraprocessed foods today are engineered for addiction, Vickerman said. It takes two to three weeks to break that addiction by replacing processed foods with healthier foods.
But there is a difference between being attracted to foods engineered to taste delicious and an actual addiction to food.
“Food addiction is real. It’s no different than alcohol addiction or drug addiction, and it comes from a place of your emotions,” Vickerman said. “Working with a professional in therapy or a psychiatrist, that’s very important, just as important as it would be if you had an alcohol or drug problem.”
The panel suggested avoiding eating late at night, which has been linked to increased inflammation. Eating in the morning, however, is key, particularly for women, Brown said, citing new research out of Stanford University.
