Patient Value, LLC | The Science

Plant based nutrition is one of the most

important, largely unused, scientific

breakthroughs in health care.

Understanding the Science

Briefly, President Bill Clinton explained that the plant based nutrition science movement “has been led by a doctor named Caldwell Esselstyn at the Cleveland Clinic, Dean Ornish …, the doctors Campbell (father and son) who wrote The China Study, and a handful of others,” including Drs. Barnard, McDougal and Klaper. They have published peer reviewed articles, and developed in depth scientifically and clinically a plant-based treatment option for a number of chronic conditions over the last 40 years.

Treating the Cause to Reverse, Halt and Prevent Disease

By treating the cause, plant based nutrition provides an opportunity to reverse, halt and prevent heart disease,

diabetes and a number of other chronic diseases, without cutting benefits.

``If Americans abandoned their toxic diets and learned a truly healthy approach to eating, we could largely reverse, halt or prevent: heart disease, strokes, diabetes, hypertension, erectile dysfunction, obesity and overweight, osteoporosis, autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis and lupus, cancers of the breast, prostate and colon, dementia.``
- Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn

``Good nutrition deals with the root causes of disease – including those as different as cancer, cardiovascular disease (e.g., cardiac arrest, stroke, and atherosclerosis), obesity, neurological disorders, diabetes, a wide variety of autoimmune diseases, and bone diseases.`` - Dr. Colin Campbell, PhD

German occupation: rapid fall of death rate

A dramatic illustration of this new science, and how quickly changing from an animal and dairy intense diet to a plant-based diet can improve health, is from the German occupation of Norway in World War II. During the occupation, the Germans confiscated most livestock and animal derived foods. As a result, the death rate from circulatory diseases dropped quickly and precipitously from 1940 to 1945:

But after the war, death rates from circulatory diseases rose quickly, as Norwegians returned to normal animal food and dairy eating habits.

Low Rates of Heart Disease,

Cancers and Other Diseases Worldwide

Where Plant Based Nutrition Dominates

PROSTATE CANCER WORLDWIDE 2008

All Ages 2008
Estimated age-standardized incidence rate per 100,000
WHO International Agency for Research on Cancer

BREAST CANCER WORLDWIDE 2008

All Ages 2008
Estimated age-standardized incidence rate per 100,000
WHO International Agency for Research on Cancer

The Blood Vessels “Magic Carpet”: The Endothelium and it’s Product Nitric Oxide

Heart Attack and Stroke are Food Borne Illnesses That Need Not Exist, nor Progress

Heart Attack and Stroke – How They Happen 90% of Time

Dr. Esselstyn briefly explains the scientific cause of heart diseases and stroke:

The Western diet of processed oils, dairy, meat, fish and poultry progressively causes endothelial dysfunction and injury, diminution of nitric oxide, increased vascular adhesion molecules, endothelial permeability, low-density lipoprotein oxidation, foam cell formation, generation of reactive oxygen species, plaque cap thinning, and plaque rupture, which lead to clinical events.

(a) Abrupt plaque rupture

(b) clot formation

blockage of blood flow that causes a heart attack

“Magically Exciting” Reversal and Halting Heart Disease

Even after a lifetime of eating the Standard American diet, it is possible to reverse or halt heart and some other diseases with plant-based nutrition. Dr. Essylstyn explains some of the science why:

The patient's plant-based diet, eliminating the ingestion of foods that injure vascular tissues, has restored strength and integrity to the endothelium. Any plaques in these patients were protectively capped and could not rupture or initiate the cascade of clotting that defines a heart attack …These patients are now heart-attack-proof.…Gradual plaque cap thickening (black arrow) and plaque shrinkage is achieved through plant-based nutrition.