Many of our patients have asked us to recommend a dietary plan for them.  As you know, there are many diets promoted, such as the Adkins Diet, the South Beach diet, the Mediterranean diet, and others.  All of them work, however, as soon as we stop the diet, the tendency is to regain the lost weight because old habits are difficult to break and many of us will resume our old dietary practices.  The diet that I feel promotes not only weight loss, but health and wellness is called the Zone diet.

The Zone diet or “OmegaZone Dietary Program” was created by Dr. Barry Sears who is one of the leading authorities in the field of drug delivery systems and dietary control of hormonal response.  He began the research which led to the development of the Zone Diet because he wanted to do what he could to maintain his own heart since all the males on his father’s side of the family died of heart disease in their early 50’s.

After earning his PhD. at Indiana University and doing his post-doctoral work at the University of Virginia, Dr. Sears did research at Boston University and MIT before developing his own biotechnology company.  In 1995, he wrote The Zone, which became a number-one New York Times bestseller and led to a revolution in nutritional thinking.  Since then he has authored many other Zone related books.  In his books, he addressed the increasing health risks associated with the growing incidences of obesity in the American population due to the increasing carbohydrate content in our American diet, and the lack of proper and precise balance of protein, carbohydrates, fats, and specialized micronutrients needed to improve insulin control.

The OmegaZone Dietary Program is all about maintaining proper hormonal balance that is  generated by the foods we eat.   There are two hormonal systems that are controlled by diet.  They are eicosanoids and insulin.  Eicosanoids are powerful cell regulators that maintain virtually all body functions and are derived from essential fatty acids.  They are controlled by the balance of our dietary intake of foods.  They are powerful hormones capable of great health benefits.  The second hormonal system that is paramount to our well being is insulin.  Insulin is controlled by the balance of dietary protein and carbohydrate at each meal.  Excessive carbohydrates will elevate our insulin level.  Excess insulin will use the necessary carbohydrates for cell function in the body and convert all the excess carbohydrates into fat.  This is disruptive to the eicosanoid balance and leads to poor health and chronic illnesses such as cancer, heart disease, strokes, arthritis, depression, hypertension, chronic pain and other related conditions.