Nutrigenomics Precision Nutrition

Tailored dietary interventions informed by individual data, including nutritional needs, genetic makeup, lifestyle, health background, and environmental factors, can effectively support individuals dealing with cancer, autoimmune conditions, and intricate chronic illnesses.

Discover the optimal foods and therapeutic dietary plans suited to your unique genetic predispositions concerning proteins, fats, carbohydrates, micronutrients, and other aspects of digestion, detoxification, stress management, and beyond.

What Is Precision Nutrition?

Precision nutrition stands apart from fleeting diet trends; it represents a reputable frontier in research, endorsed by the National Institutes of Health within the realm of precision medicine. (1,2) Precision medicine aims to enhance individualized disease management, while precision nutrition specifically targets dietary choices. Both approaches craft interventions based on a person's distinct characteristics, encompassing genetics, ethnicity, gender, medical history, and lifestyle.

Central to precision nutrition is acknowledging that individuals may react diversely to specific foods and nutrients. Thus, the optimal diet varies from person to person and may evolve in response to changing factors.

An intriguing facet of precision nutrition is its recognition of the microbiome. This intricate network of trillions of bacteria in our bodies is not unique but also vital to our physiological functions. Our dietary patterns can shape the composition of gut bacteria, influencing how we metabolize certain foods and determining which foods are most beneficial. This symbiotic relationship is only beginning to be unraveled.

How Does It Work?

Precision nutrition, or personalized nutrition, shifts its focus from collective populations to individuals. While numerous nutritional studies offer valuable insights for communities and the broader public, superior-quality research highlights the benefits of increased consumption of vegetables, whole grains, and lean proteins, coupled with reduced intake of highly processed foods containing added sugars and salt, for averting various diseases in the average person. However, investigations such as the PREDICT 1 trial, which concentrates on individual reactions to food, reveal significant disparities in blood glucose and triglyceride responses even when participants consume identical meals. 3 The individual's microbiome has been identified as contributing to post-meal blood triglyceride level variations.

Furthermore, non-dietary factors like sleep patterns, physical activity levels, and meal timing also influence fluctuations in blood glucose and triglyceride levels after eating. (3) personalized nutrition guidance tailored to individual needs may offer more significant benefits beyond generic health recommendations. Precision nutrition assesses an individual's genetic makeup, microbiome composition, and metabolic responses to specific foods or dietary patterns to devise the most effective eating regimen for the self-management of disease processes.

Applying Precision Nutrition to Self-Directed Disease Management

Specific dietary interventions based on genetic data have been established for several years, including the adoption of a gluten-free diet for individuals managing celiac disease, a lactose-free diet for those with lactose intolerance, and the restriction of dietary phenylalanine found in protein foods and certain artificial sweeteners, for individuals with phenylketonuria (PKU), an inherited disorder. Ongoing research explores the potential of precision nutrition in addressing conditions such as obesity, metabolic syndrome, specific cancers, and type 2 diabetes (T2DM).

For instance, conventional management of T2DM typically emphasizes lifestyle modifications such as regular exercise, dietary adjustments, and achieving a healthy weight, often supplemented with medications. Precision nutrition aims to refine diabetes management by examining the following domains in greater detail: (4,5)

• How an individual's DNA may influence the absorption and processing of specific nutrients, thereby predicting their response to particular dietary regimens.
• Analyzing metabolites, which are small molecules produced during the breakdown and digestion of food, unveils a person's habitual dietary habits, such as regular consumption of fruits and vegetables or a high intake of saturated fats from daily meat and butter consumption. Precision nutrition explores potential correlations between a person's metabolic "signature" resulting from these dietary habits and their susceptibility to developing type 2 diabetes (T2DM). Utilizing metabolic testing in conjunction with precision nutrition could aid in assessing how an individual's body might react to specific dietary interventions.
• Identify strains of gut bacteria associated with improved blood glucose regulation and implement dietary strategies to modulate one's microbiome to promote the proliferation and maintenance of these beneficial gut bacteria.

Applying Precision Nutrition to Specific Foods

Precision nutrition investigates the potential link between an individual's genetic makeup and reaction to particular foods. Take coffee, for example. Have you ever observed how some people can consume multiple cups throughout the day without experiencing any adverse effects, while others may feel jittery and anxious after just one cup?

Coffee beans contain compounds that offer health benefits, but not everyone can tolerate the stimulants found in coffee, such as caffeine and catechols. Research has identified specific genes associated with coffee consumption. (6)These genes may influence the rate at which caffeine and catechols in coffee are metabolized, contributing to anti-inflammatory effects and a reduced risk of specific chronic ailments. Precision nutrition utilizes genetic information like this to ascertain whether an individual might benefit from increasing or decreasing their coffee intake.

Additional research explores whether a high intake of saturated fats could predispose someone to weight gain or if excessive salt consumption raises the risk of developing high blood pressure. However, findings from these studies have yet to be replicated across diverse populations. (7)

Preferred Nutrigenomics Testing Companies

Not all genetic tests are created equally. When designing a precision nutrition plan for self-management of cancer, autoimmunity, or chronic illness we need as thorough of a genetic report as possible.

The following vendors are the most thorough on the market for this purpose.

• 3x4 Genetics (must order through practitioner)
• Nutrition Genome (order online)

References:

1. Collins FS, Varmus H. A new initiative on precision medicine. New England journal of medicine. 2015 Feb 26;372(9):793-5.
2. Rodgers GP, Collins FS. Precision nutrition—the answer to “what to eat to stay healthy”. JAMA. 2020 Aug 25;324(8):735-6.
3. Berry SE, Valdes AM, Drew DA, Asnicar F, Mazidi M, Wolf J, Capdevila J, Hadjigeorgiou G, Davies R, Al Khatib H, Bonnett C. Human postprandial responses to food and potential for precision nutrition. Nature Medicine. 2020 Jun 11:1-0. Disclosure: TDS, SEB, AMV, FA, PWF, LMD and NS are consultants to Zoe Global Ltd (‘Zoe’). JW, GH, RD, HA., JC, CB, SG, EB, PW and IL are or have been employees of Zoe.
4. Wang DD, Hu FB. Precision nutrition for prevention and management of type 2 diabetes. The lancet Diabetes & endocrinology. 2018 May 1;6(5):416-26. Disclosure: FBH reports personal fees from Metagenics and grants from California Walnut Commission, outside the submitted work.
5. Zeevi D, Korem T, Zmora N, Israeli D, Rothschild D, Weinberger A, Ben-Yacov O, Lador D, Avnit-Sagi T, Lotan-Pompan M, Suez J. Personalized nutrition by prediction of glycemic responses. Cell. 2015 Nov 19;163(5):1079-94.
6. Cornelis MC, Byrne EM, Esko T, Nalls MA, Ganna A, Paynter N, Monda KL, Amin N, Fischer K, Renstrom F, Ngwa JS. Genome-wide meta-analysis identifies six novel loci associated with habitual coffee consumption. Molecular psychiatry. 2015 May;20(5):647.
7. Toro-Martín D, Arsenault BJ, Després JP, Vohl MC. Precision nutrition: a review of personalized nutritional approaches for the prevention and management of metabolic syndrome. Nutrients. 2017 Aug;9(8):913.