Where can I find ACTUAL reaserch studies on raw foods?
January 27, 2011 - 5:18pm
#1
There hasn't been too many, especially not in the U.S. I'm currently reading this book:
http://www.amazon.com/Becoming-Raw-Essential-Guide-Vegan/dp/1570...
which is going over all the studies done ever in raw foods (because there aren't that many). Check it out, it's got a wealth of information in it. So far though, the studies done have shown very good results in favor of raw foods, for the most part. Obviously, more research is needed, you need to do repeatable scientific experiments over and over again to prove something but like I said, so far what I've read all the results for raw foods have been positive.
January 28, 2011 - 3:55am
#2
Theres obviously quite alot of research into the various potential benefits of fruits and vegetables which is largely raw food.
But i dont think there are many if only a few little studies on raw food diet in general.
I will try and have a search later when im free.
January 29, 2011 - 2:48am
#3
A few bits and pieces here:
http://www.beyondveg.com/cat/links-out/raw-research.shtml
http://rawfoodlifestyles.com/raw-food-diet/raw-food-facts-resear...
http://www.beyondveg.com/tu-j-l/raw-cooked/raw-cooked-1a.shtml
http://www.iowasource.com/food/lenkastudy_0806.html
http://health101.org/art_studies.htm
You will note I haven't gone out of my way to cherry pick the positives, but many of the 'negatives' are issues the well informed raw foodie will be aware of such as the need to ensure adequate intake of calories, vit B12, seaweed etc.
January 30, 2011 - 11:13am
#4
The link to the Lenka study was interesting, but I have reservations about studies that depend on self-reporting.
I agree with the person who recommended 'Becoming Raw'. That book has a wealth of solid nutritional information in it, written by two people who are registered dieticians and practicing raw food vegans. It has tons of footnotes to studies reported in reputable medical/nutritional journals.
Gabriel Cousens is an MD who is a noted raw food teacher and healer. All his books are footnoted. While the 'Raw in 30 days' DVD is aimed at a non-specialist audience and involved a very small population, still it showed clearly that Type II diabetics could go off insulin very quickly on a raw diet, and that Type I diabetics could drastically cut down on the amount of insulin they need.
Although not 100% raw, you should check into books by Dr. Caldwell Esselstyne, Dr. Dean Ornish, Dr. John MacDougall, and Dr. Joel Fuhrman. All of these medical doctors are very much into a vegan diet; most of them (Fuhrman in particular) recommend that the majority of fruits and vegetables eaten be raw. I am currently reading the new edition of Dr. Fuhrman's 'Eat to live'--footnotes galore. There is anecdotal evidence in the book (testimonials by patients) which is quite inspiring, but far more important are the wealth of footnotes to articles.
I would also recommending checking PubMed (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed) It is an online database of articles from medical and scientific journals. It is not a 100% full text database; in other words, for most of the articles in PubMed, you'd need access to a medical library in order to get the full text of the articles. When I searched 'raw food diet cancer' there were 175 hits; not many were full text and not every hit was relevant, but there is definitely information out there; it just isn't freely available on the web.
From the search I described above, here is a free full-text article on raw cruciferous vegetables and bladder cancer:
Here's another one:
The full text, while free, is in Lithuanian! The link above is an abstract in English.
Note: I am not myself a medical librarian. I would recommend going to a medical library and getting some help using this database. It's great, but it is aimed at specialists and not a lay audience. Even though I am a librarian, if I wanted to use PubMed effectively for research, I'd ask a medical librarian for help in how to use it and how to construct good search strategies. PubMed, and other journal databases, are NOT like Google. In order to get targeted results without a lot of noise, a librarian is your best friend.
Hope this helps.
