Dr. Dean Ornish's lifestyle solution to coronary artery disease.
 

Can you provide a link to some of those leading cardiologists?

His Lifestyle Heart Trial study was published in the Lancet and five year data was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

That's non-scientific? Before you try to ruin someone's reputation you should at least offer some proof of what you say.

Medicare Pays for the Ornish Diet-and-Yoga Heart Program
 

I think Pritikin started it all. Ornish just carried it on. I've read both and am convinced, but don't follow it exactly.

Here's one link to a cardiologist who says Ornish is a scam artist.
http://www.wellsphere.com/weight-los...-a-scam/277092

The biggest problem with guys like Ornish and Esselstyn is that they are unrealistic. Ornish has admitted that his diet is difficult to stay on. Most people are simply not willing to do what they ask even if they believe that it would work. Most people are just going to think that they are too extreme.

People don't believe that you have to be that extreme to live a long, healthy life.

How many people on this site would be willing to completely give up all meats, including chicken and fish and all dairy as well as all oil? No fish oil, no olive oil or coconut oil for cooking. You'd COMPLETELY give up ice cream, candy, eggs and as I said, meats. The on top of that try to keep the levels of your starchy vegetables and sugar down and make sure that you eat no processed foods.

Just as an example, how many of you on this forum would be willing to do that if they were guaranteed that they would lose weight and reverse they heart disease?

Please answer yes or no.

There was also a guy named Dr Robert Haas who billed himself as a sports nutritionist. He had some high profile clients like Martina Navratalova. Jack Nicklaus went on his program for a while and got off because he said that he was feeling weak and tired all the time.

I went for it big time when I was playing professional golf, but I gained a ton of weight. The problem was that Haas recommended whole grains as the major part of your diet. I was eating pasta all the time. And I felt like crap and my golf game didn't get any better.

2- yes

5 years

Ornish can be extreme however I take bits of his advice along with Dr Oz, Dr weil and a few others, combined with my experience and try to live a healthy lifestyle

Several years ago I met and talked to someone at the Houston Yacht Club who said he was a heart patient and was told by his doctors that he must eat no meat, poultry, fish, or dairy products. Imagining his severely restricted diet, I felt so sorry for him. Now, I bet he was following the Ornish diet. Dr. Ornish used to practice in Houston and preached that heart disease could be reversed by diet.

I have tried and been successful several months at a time not eating any meat, pork or chicken, but I did eat salmon. It was difficult because it was so completely different than the way I was raised or think. I didn't know how to relate to thanksgiving without turkey or New Years Eve without standing rib.

Give up ice cream---definitely no!!

No oil, milk, eggs, nuts? And you said that you did eat salmon. Are you still doing this?

Which brings up another point. a lot of people will try this and do it for a few months. Jimbo2012 is one of the very few that have been able to maintain it for a long period of time.

How many people will keep it as a lifestyle for the rest of their lives?

That's exactly my point. According to radical extremists like Ornish and Esselstyn, you are not living a healthy lifestyle unless you go along 100% with their program. ZERO oil. ZERO meat. A little bit to them is the same as nothing.

Esselstyn admits to having a handful of Reece's Mini Peanut Butter Cups every New Years Eve. That's his big cheat. Once a year.

I honestly don't think that one percent of the people in this country or the rest of the developed world are willing to live like that.

I'm not still doing it because I couldn't wrap my head around how to do it and keep doing it. I still eat very little meat except once in awhile when I go on a rampage. Just out of curiosity, do you eat meat, nuts, milk, etc.? If not, what do you eat? Jimbo2012, how did you do it?

Years ago, in the late '70s, we ran into a couple at a campground. The husband had been to Pritikin because of a heart condition and was on a very restricted diet. We visited them one evening in their mobile home. The equivalent of one whole room in that mobile home was filled with the required special grains , flour, a flour milling machine, bread machine and other associated stuff that he required to maintain that special diet. It's a good thing they were retired because they had to spend all day preparing meals.

12 years ago I had a little high BP requiring higher doses of drugs over the years until 5 years ago , same on cholesterol.

I gave the Plant diet a try, in 3 weeks my BP started to drop dramatically, had to cut down little by little over several months, then it it 115-120 over 70-75.
BP pills gone for ever.

The cholesterol took a few months to get to 135 or so, again no meds

Lost about 35-40lbs

How do we (my wife also is on it but for the sake of the animals no med issues) do it

We do it because the results give us inspiration to continue, was it hard, well not easy, takes a few months to lose the graving.

Our Dr here has 1200 patients, we are the only two that he never writes a script for. :shrug:

.

I doubt Dr. Ornish would be happy about being mentioned in the same sentence as Dr. Oz. :laugh:

You bring up a very interesting point. As you and Dr Ornish have said, this diet can be difficult. I would imagine it gets easier as time goes by. But what if your spouse and/or children aren't willing to go along with the plan? What happens when your wife wants to go to Longhorn Steak house? How does one deal with making two separate meals three times a day?

The short answer is yes it would be more difficult with more cooking.

Well, why wouldn't your spouse want you to live healthier & hopefully longer life without meds.

I assume ones spouse would or he/she will be making two meals at a time.
Or maybe the spouse just don't get it.

If the meals are cooked right they are very tasty, don't think for a minute they bland like eating cardboard.

There are numerous cook books with plant based diets that are great.

If all that fails Longhorn has something I can eat, I'm going out to eat to socialize not because I'm starving. Have a drink and relax.

.

Dr. Dean Ornish's lifestyle solution to coronary artery disease.
 

Good for you. I'm pleased to hear that it has had such a positive impact on your health. I looked back but could not tell whether you did Pritikan or Ornish.

Primarily Dr Esseltyn, some Ornish & McDougal

I respect you for staying with it. :eclipsee_gold_cup:

Jimbo, I admire your commitment to your plant-based lifestyle.
Serious question.
Do you think your improvement in blood pressure and cholesterol happened because you lost 40 lbs, or because of your plant-based diet?
I realize that your diet was a key factor in your weight loss, but if you had lost 40 lbs on a different type of diet, do you think your numbers would still have significantly improved?

I agree. I have a tremendous amount of respect for people who are able to maintain any kind of diet over a long period of time.

For the same reason that 99.9% of all of the people in the developed world don't do it. People like various foods. People enjoy eating meat, nuts, eggs, milk and everything else that people on this diet don't eat. In addition people don't want to be bothered with learning a new way to cook and shop.

Like I said, I have all the respect in the world for people who are able to do this, but the fact is that very few people are willing to make the sacrifices necessary.

That in addition to the fact that it hasn't been scientifically proven that this diet will work for everyone. There are some examples like yourself of where it has worked well, but there haven't been enough appropriate studies to prove it efficacy.

Most people either don't believe that one has to be so extreme. They feel that by simply cutting back on fats or sugars or by eating a few less calories, they are eating healthily. Or they don't think that it will work, or they don't want to give up eating the foods that they love. Some simply feel that they'd rather live a few years less and enjoy the things they like.

The bottom line is that if a diet requires too much of people, they won't go for it or they won't stay on it. Any diet that is too difficult won't be helping very many people.

No absolutely not, the BP started a big drop in less than 30 days, at that point I may have lost 4lbs.

There were other tests done to monitor all that was going on, but to detailed to get into here

Yes they want to be bothered taking meds it's easier.

You and I had this dialog before I'm not going to repeat all the data,

but it has been proven many times worldwide, I know you tried it and couldn't stick with unfortunately.

Some need a serious visit to ER to find the will power.

But one must pray they make it out of ER.

Jimbo, thanks for the reply. You have impressive willpower.

Glad to hear that you know about it and are convinced. You don't have to follow it exactly as long as you are doing well. The strictest diet is for those who are trying to reverse their disease. Once that's accomplished, I believe Ornish has a somewhat less strict diet for maintenance.

Seems like many agree with me. If it were easy, it wouldn't require will power

Yes, it is easier. Not saying that it's better just that it's easier.

And you and I have had this discussion before and I still have not seen any unbiased scientific studies. What I have seen is a lot of anecdotal evidence from biased sources. The same thing can be found on the no carb, low carb, paleo diets. They all seem to work for some people.

I'm one who would disagree. For me switching from a high protein diet to veganism was easy once I established a routine after a few weeks. The first few weeks required some thought as to how I should go about it because I didn't have any formal instructions. Sure there are books with recipes but I really dislike following recipes.

What did I do before switching? I had tried the Paleo diet and then decided to try the blood type diet. Having type O blood called for eating limited amounts of animal protein.

Why was switching over easy? It was easy because I derive a great deal of enjoyment/pleasure from eating healthy whole foods. I like fresh fruit, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, nuts and seeds etc. And I don't require lots of spices. I mainly use fresh garlic, fresh onion and turmeric powder. (No more olive oil; I use nuts instead.)