Adherence to a healthy plant diet may reduce inflammatory factors in obese and overweight women-a cross-sectional study

ObjectiveObesity and overweight which are consequence of some interaction factor such as genetics and behavioral habit. Obesity as a metabolic disorder and chronic inflammation is a trigger to countless disease. The main goal of this study is to investigate the interaction of herbal diet on the levels of liver enzymes, inflammatory factors and adipocytes profile.Materials and methodsA total of 240 adult women range of 18–48 years were included in the current comparative cross-sectional study. Body composition and dietary intake (using a validated semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire (FFQ)) were assessed in all participants. In determining a plant based diet index (PDI), vegetarian foods were taken positive score and reverse points for animal foods. For determining a healthful plant based diet index (hPDI), healthy plant foods received positive scores, while less healthy plant foods and animal foods received reverse scores. To create an unhealthful plant-based diet index (uPDI), positive scores were assigned to less healthy plant foods and reverse scores to healthy plant foods and animal foods. For the measurement of serum liver enzymes and inflammatory factors, an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) method was used.ResultsHealthy diet like whole grains, fruits, vegetables, cereals, and beverages such as tea and coffee, based on dietary guidelines, significantly reduced the amount of hs-CRP and TGF-β (P < 0.0001). Higher adhering to hPDI may as a result in higher intake of fiber intake, antioxidants, unsaturated fats, micronutrients, could reduce saturated fats and iron content, and finally weight loss, and reduce inflammation in the body.ConclusionBase on our finding, in those people who intake higher amounts of healthy plant foods, (vegetable types), instead of unhealthy herbal foods (sweets and desserts), might be useful to reduce inflammation factor like TGF-β and hs-CRP. Women with a higher compliance score in uPDI group (juices, refined grains, starches sweetened with sugar, sweets, and desserts) did not have significantly increase in inflammatory factors levels.