subject: Vegan diets Plan: How to Get Best nutrition and Benefits [print this page] Vegan diets Plan: How to Get Best nutrition and Benefits
A well-planned vegetarian diet is a healthy way to meet your nutritional needs.
You may follow a vegetarian diet for cultural, religious or ethical reasons. Or you may eat a vegetarian diet to stay healthy and prevent health problems, such as cardiovascular disease. Whatever your reasons for choosing a vegetarian diet, this guide will help you make smart choices to ensure that you meet your daily nutritional needs.
Indeed, a well-planned vegetarian diet can meet the needs of people of all ages, including children, teenagers, and pregnant or breast-feeding women. The key is to be aware of your nutritional needs so that you plan a diet that meets them. If you aren't sure how to create a vegetarian diet that's right for you, talk with your doctor and a registered dietitian.
When people think about a vegetarian diet, they typically think about a diet that doesn't include meat, poultry or fish. But vegetarian diets can be further categorized into three types:
1.Vegan diets exclude meat, poultry, fish, eggs and dairy products and foods that contain these products.
2.Lacto-vegetarian diets exclude meat, fish, poultry and eggs, as well as foods that contain them. Dairy products, such as milk, cheese, yogurt and butter, are allowed in a lacto-vegetarian diet.
3.Lacto-ovo vegetarian diets exclude meat, fish and poultry, but allow eggs and dairy products.
Some people follow a semivegetarian diet also called a flexitarian diet which is primarily a plant-based diet but includes meat, dairy, eggs, poultry and fish on occasion or in small quantities.
Vegetarian diet pyramid
Health Benefits of Vegetarianism
A vegetarian diet provides a variety of proven health benefits. Vegetarians have significantly reduced rates of obesity, coronary heart disease, hypertension, type II diabetes, diet-related cancers, diverticular disease, constipation and gall stones.
In addition to being richer in fruits and vegetables, vegetarian diets tend to be lower in total fat. Taber & Cook (1980) found lacto-ovo vegetarians to consume an average of 35 percent of energy as fat, compared to omnivores consuming over 40 percent of energy as fat.
A study of the diets of a group of French vegetarians found they had a daily intake of 25 percent less fat than non-vegetarians (Millet, 1989). Vegetarians also tend to eat proportionally more polyunsaturated fat to saturated fat compared with non-vegetarians. Animal products are the major sources of dietary saturated fat.
