Are You Evidence Based?

Understanding the true meaning of "Evidence-based Approach" is of paramount importance if we are all to speak the same language when it comes to health & the role played by Nutrition. Over the years, I've had my share of experience with science and pseudoscience as well as following 'experts' who turned out to be gimps - all part of my development to being a 'good' Evidence-Based Nutrition practitioner while also being careful to not be too evidence based or over sciency (tough one, i agree!)

For starters, let's focus on the ALTERNATIVES to Evidence based Nutrition so you and your clients / patients stay protected against quacks.

• Religion-Based Nutrition: Nothing wrong with this so long as the individual understands that their nutritional choices are indeed their choices and have nothing necessarily to do with science or health. Sabarimala Ayyappa mandala fasting, Lent fasting,Ramadan fasting are all good examples.
• Faith-Based Nutrition : Similar to religion-based nutrition but with one distinct difference - this faith has nothing to do with religion. This is where the 'Nutritionally religious zealots' live! They have beliefs about nutrition contrary to scientific evidence. These individuals will so often try to convert others to their 'way' as the one true way for everyone. Will also throw in words like 'science' and 'evidence' but at the first sign of defeat will retreat to 'well its worked for me' (an unscientific statement) or 'i believe it personally,you should respect that'. Example Ketogenic diet. Did you know?I used to be biased to the Paleo diet once upon a time ??
• Bro-Based Nutrition - general dumb sh*t! A mix match of other types of nutrition that someone with zero ability to think critically has taken on board and wound up with a crazy version of nutrition that has absolutely no basis or consistency. They believe everything they hear that is said with enough confidence and pass it on to anyone who will listen. The worst scenario is when someone with good genetics becomes a fountain of bro-based nutrition advice. if someone's reasoning hints on the fact that they have great results, great abs, lots of money, etc..this is a sure fire way to spot them. Common example is Biosignature.
• Money-Based Nutrition advice , which you'd think is easy to spot but it isn't! Why? Because of marketing, scare-mongering and many money based nutrition practitioners having other tendencies (Hippy-Based nutrition advice, discussed later). Many of these individuals truly believe in what they are selling initially and believe it will help others. There are also the ones who are simply out to make money. They all sell 'advanced' supplements with fancy methods of delivery, etc because it gives them a USP to make money. Good example are the Supplement & Gut healing protocol pushers.
• Hippy-Based Nutrition advice - Very often the Nutritional therapy crowd fits into this bracket.You will also find plenty of faith & experience-based individuals here. The commonality here is that the 'world we live in is out to get us' is their mantra. We must ONLY have 'natural' things, avoid anything 'man-made' or 'processed',however these definitions are often rife with inconsistencies. Many conspiracy theories that have some basis, e.g., sugar lobbying are then taken way beyond their actual facts to the point where those who sell sugar WANT to kill/control everyone. I've had my share of experience with this crowd,genuinely nice people but smarter to run the other direction ??

Being a truly evidence-based practitioner is not easy : Be prepared to work on both your knowledge AND experience. Always maintain integrity. Invest in developing a critical mindset and remember a crucial part of being evidence-based is changing your views in light of new research. As @Martin Macdonald from Mac-Nutrition Uni (https://www.mac-nutritionuni.com) would say, "Swallow your pride occasionally, it's not fattening".