It’s one of the most persistent and seemingly irresolvable debates in the world of health–what, exactly, should we be eating if we want to stay happy and healthy? With obesity rates high and rising across North America, heart disease becomes a crucial factor to consider as you get older. And now, there is a new major study funded by the American National Institutes of Health and published in the Annals of Internal Medicine that puts a surprising new twist on the old wisdom about healthy eating.

The upshot of the study is that reducing your intake of carbohydrates (think bread, pasta, potatoes) and instead eating more fat will have you shedding pounds and it will keep your heart healthier too.

It may seem like this is kind of old news and in a way it is, the Atkins diet and others like it have been preaching this basic formula since the 1970s at least: eat meat and vegetables and you’ll stay fit and healthy. But what’s so interesting about this new study is that it’s the first of its kind to be conducted without restrictions on calorie intake. Hard to believe? Maybe, but it’s true. The subjects in this study followed a low-carb diet for a year but could eat as much as they wanted, and they still lost weight and gained significant markers of increased heart health.

“To my knowledge, this is one of the first long-term trials that’s given these diets without calorie restrictions,” said Dariush Mozaffarian, dean of the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, to the New York Times. “It shows that in a free-living setting, cutting your carbs helps you lose weight without focusing on calories. And that’s really important because someone can change what they eat more easily than trying to cut down on their calories.”

The study took a group of 150 men and women and split them into two groups, one group was to eat a low-fat diet for a year and the other was to eat a low-carbohydrate diet. Subjects in the low-carb group not only lost about eight more pounds, on average, than those in the low fat group, but they also had less bad fat circulating in their blood, more HDL, or good cholesterol, and they lowered their risk of heart attack in the next 10 years versus the low fat group.

As interesting as this study is, it should be noted that this debate will continue and that many scientists disagree, so don’t consider this definitive, just think of it as one more piece of information on the way to understanding our diets and health.

Watch Out For Artificial Sweeteners

In a recent issue of the journal, Nature, researchers revealed that artificial sweeteners may actually be contributing to the current obesity and diabetes epidemics. Despite having no actual sugar—and in most cases no actual calories—the artificial sweeteners have been shown to raise blood sugar levels in both mice and humans because they interfere with microbial activity in the stomach.

In the abstract to the report, the authors sum up their finding this way: “Here we demonstrate that consumption of commonly used [artificial sweetener] formulations drives the development of glucose intolerance through induction of compositional and functional alterations to the intestinal microbiota.”

Stated in less scientific terms, the authors of the report are claiming that the widespread use of artificial sweeteners may be in part responsible for the widely seen increases in diabetes and obesity. “Our findings suggest that non-caloric artificial sweeteners may have directly contributed to enhancing the exact epidemic that they themselves were intended to fight,” said researcher Eran Segal.

While the exact mechanism by which the artificial sweeteners contribute to obesity and diabetes remains unclear, the researchers believe they may promote the growth of bacterial species that work to extract and store fat. In any case, the findings were clear–the more artificial sweetener consumed by mice or by humans, the more markers of disease were found in the bloodstream.

Of course, the findings are not yet reason enough to panic, though as in all matters, moderation is probably a good idea.

New Research On PTSD

In an effort to provide some diagnostic rigour to the assessment of injuries like post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI), the Canadian Armed Forces recently teamed up with the neuroimaging specialists at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto.

The aim was to use the doctors’ special skills at a type of brain scan called magnetoencephalography (MEG) to discover whether PTSD or TBI could be “seen” or if it had a characteristic physical effect on the brain. A discovery such as this would be a breakthrough for the diagnosis of the two ailments, which are currently being diagnosed through the assessment of psychological symptoms.

“While the two disorders can be confused because of similar behavioural symptoms, the data show that they are very distinct,” said Dr. Margot Taylor, co-investigator of the research and Director of Functional Neuroimaging and senior scientist at Sick Kids. “This research could lead to faster diagnosis based on objective measures rather than having a soldier self-identify, which according to Canadian Forces Health Services is an ongoing challenge.”

While Sick Kids had previously been using MEG–which is the most precise brain-imaging tool currently available–to diagnose children with epilepsy and Autism Spectrum Disorder, there was sufficient reason to believe it could be useful in spotting other brain dysfunction.

As it turns out, that hypothesis was correct. After studying a group of soldiers and civilians suffering from PTSD and/or TBI, and contrasting those studies with a control group of subjects with similar military experience but no history of brain injury, researchers reported that the differences in brain activity between the two groups was notable and significant, with the injured group having a far higher level of brain activity, even during rest.

The results show enormous promise for the treatment of PTSD and TBI. In addition to a more definite diagnosis, the objective nature of the brain scan could help reduce the stigma associated with PTSD by revealing it to be an actual brain injury, rather than merely a set of psychological symptoms.

“The ultimate goal of providing objective diagnostic testing for PTSD and TBI is to not only to better understand the conditions and make fast, accurate diagnoses, but also to be able to test the individual to determine if he or she can safely return to service,” said Taylor.