Ornish Lifestyle Medicine Diet Quotes

An important report was published in the prestigious British journal Lancet in July 1990 (Vol. 336, pp. 129–33). A large team headed by Dr. Dean Ornish of the University of California San Francisco School of Medicine did a randomized, controlled study in which they demonstrated that lifestyle changes (practiced for a year) could actually reverse the process of atherosclerosis (arteriosclerosis, hardening) in coronary arteries. The patients in the experimental group were put on a low-fat, low-cholesterol vegetarian diet; participated in stress-management activities like meditation, relaxation, imagery, breathing techniques, and stretching exercises; and did moderate aerobic exercise regularly. In addition, there were twice-weekly group discussions to provide social support and reinforce adherence to the lifestyle change program. The control (nonexperimental) group of patients showed an increase in coronary atherosclerosis. With the decrease in blockage of the coronary arteries, experimental patients also experienced a reduction in the frequency, duration, and severity of angina (chest pain) while the control group had an increase in angina over the one-year period. This obviously important report shows what has long been suspected: that it is not just diet, exercise, and other purely physical factors that determine whether or not there will be hardening of the arteries but psychosocial factors as well. I predict that further experimentation will identify the person’s emotional state as being the most important variable and that intensive psychotherapy alone will demonstrate a similar reversal of atherosclerosis.