There were some amazing presentations that appeared to me to be truly groundbreaking
Dr Ben Bikman “Insulin vs. Glucagon: The relevance of dietary protein”
In this presentation Dr Bikman presented research that showed that when one is in a state of ketosis, eating proteins does not cause the production of insulin, whereas if one it not fat adapted than proteins will cause a dramatic increase in insulin levels.
Thus this research shows for example that eating a steak will be totally fine for someone in ketosis but may cause a massive insulin spike if one is not.
Dr Mike Eades “A new hypothesis of obesity”
In this presentation Dr Eades presented a thesis that eating saturated fat was actually protective against obesity whereas eating polyunsaturated oils promoted obesity. He then described the precise mechanisms where this might occur. He included within that research data that showed that for example eating a baked potato with butter induced free living satiety at circa 700 calories, whereas eating french fries cooked in polyunsaturated fats induced free living satiety at circa 1100 calories. When the increase in polyunsaturated fats is then overlaid over the rise in obesity the thesis explains not only the increase in inflammation via polyunsaturated oils but ALSO why humans upped their intake of carbohydrates and thus created the obesity crisis.
Interestingly this presentation also served to suggest mechanisms whereby both coconut oils and butter may be more protective against obesity than olive oil ( though that maybe still a little protective )
Nina Teicholz “The Unknown Story of Vegetable Oils: their History and Impact on Health” When taken with the above lecture, my takeaway was that poly-unsaturated fats truly are poisonous that need to be avoided at all costs and that one should be very very careful of cooking with any type of liquid oil including olive oils.
Food should be cooked using stuff that is solid - butter, coconut , duck fat, goose fat, tallow, ghee.
Dave Feldman “Cholesterol is a Passenger, Not a Driver”
Dave presented graphics which move the understanding of what LDL cholesterol is for, which when combined with David Diamond's talk on statins is perhaps going to be the way that one can finally put to bed the fear of an increase in LDL cholesterol which may result from LCHF
Dr David Diamond “An Assessment of Cardiovascular Risks of a Low Carbohydrate High Fat Diet”
There was some interesting sparring between Dr Phinney and Megan Ramos regarding fasting.
Dr Stephen Phinney “The Metabolic Effects of Fasting: A Two-Edged Sword” and Megan Ramos “Practical Fasting: The clinical application of therapeutic fasting in the treatment of metabolic syndrome”
Ultimately it seems to boil down to the difference between adopting fasting in relatively healthy slimmish individuals that might cause a breakdown in muscle and the impact in seriously obese individuals with significant metabolic issues Megan reported that Intensive Dietary Management had not observed such a reduction and that they would be reporting on that in due course.
Inflammation
This was hit from several angles
Dr Stephen Phinney “Inflammation, Nutritional Ketosis, and Metabolic Disease”,
Dr Georgia Ede “Our Descent Into Madness – Modern Diets and the Global Mental Health Crisis”
Dr Evelyne Bourdua-Roy “Chronic Pain and the Low Carb and Ketogenic Diets”
In addition there was an inspirational talk in the round up from a guy concerning the impact of the keto diet on a friend with cancer.
In sum all of these presentations effectively provided support to the fact that it is hyperinsulinaemia that drives many forms of disease and chronic pain.
Dr Andrew Mente used the PURE study to provide evidence of the optimal levels of salt, and to reiterate the point that saturated fat is NOT connected to heart disease.
“Dietary Sodium Consumption, Cardiovascular Disease and Mortality: What is the Current Evidence?” also
“Dietary Fat, Carbohydrate Consumption, Cardiovascular Disease and Mortality in PURE: A More Complete Picture”
It seems that it is intended to produce a new analysis from the PURE study that focuses on polyunsaturated fat so it will be interesting to see if that confirms these latest presentations.
Dr Sarah Hallberg “Ketogenic Diet for Diabetes” Dr Hallberg presented the Virta Health study results which we are already familiar with. One new point was around White Blood Cell impact - where there were substantial reductions across the board. I checked my own and yes I had a similar effect . WBC is apparently a marker for heart disease !
Nina Teicholz gave an update on the Nutrition Coalition which I will cover in a separate post.
