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Lifestyle Patterns of Chronic Disease

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Integrative and Functional Medical Nutrition Therapy

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Abstract

Over the past decade, infectious diseases have essentially been eradicated and nutrient deficiencies become a thing of the past. Noncommunicable or chronic disease has become the major cause of death in the modern era. The prevalence is increasing, not only in developed nations, but has become a dominant health burden for developing countries. Even though children born today are expected to live longer, the quality of their lives is threatened by the burden of chronic disease.

Chronic diseases are genetic and lifestyle-related. While some diseases have a well-defined genetic component, albeit still being discovered, a majority of them are related to lifestyle choices such as inactivity, poor diet, stress, socioeconomic status, and the environment. What is happening is that some of these influences are actually becoming part of the genetic makeup of generations to come and, if not identified and addressed, will have a definitive effect on human health and wellbeing for a very long time.

This chapter reviews chronic disease from primary origins, those that one has little control over such as genetics, and secondary origins, those with potential for more individual control, including nutrition and diet. The tertiary origin category focuses on preventing or managing the chronic disease based on what is known about the individual or small groups of individuals by identifying risk markers and genomic risk and addressing post-diagnosis complications of these conditions.

Addressing chronic disease through lifestyle medicine by means of an interventional approach to decrease risk and illness appears to be the most effective and logical manner to improve health. It is probable that lifestyle medicine will become the primary approach to prevention in the future.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Peak Nutrition Consultants, Montrose, CO, USA

    Sarah Harding Laidlaw

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  1. Sarah Harding Laidlaw
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Noland Nutrition, Burbank, CA, USA

    Diana Noland

  2. Professor Emeritus, School of Medicine, University of Kansas Health System, Kansas City, KS, USA

    Jeanne A. Drisko

  3. Department of Dietetics & Nutrition, University of Kansas Medical Center, Kansas City, KS, USA

    Leigh Wagner

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Laidlaw, S.H. (2020). Lifestyle Patterns of Chronic Disease. In: Noland, D., Drisko, J., Wagner, L. (eds) Integrative and Functional Medical Nutrition Therapy. Humana, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-30730-1_33

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-30730-1_33

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  • Publisher Name: Humana, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-30729-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-30730-1

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