"Let food be thy medicine..."

doi:10.1136/bmj.328.7433.0-g

BMJ 2004;328 (24 January), doi:10.1136/bmj.328.7433.0-g

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"Let food be thy medicine..."

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Mark Lucock ends his review of the science of folic acid byquoting Hippocrates: "Let food be thy medicine and medicinebe thy food" (p 211). Although many patients are convinced ofthe importance of food in both causing and relieving their problems,many doctors' knowledge of nutrition is rudimentary. Most feelmuch more comfortable with drugs than foods, and the "food asmedicine" philosophy of Hippocrates has been largely neglected.That may be about to change. Concern about obesity is rocketingup political agendas, and a growing interest in the scienceof functional foods is opening up many therapeutic possibilities(p 180).

It was in 1931 that Lucy Wills described how yeast extract couldbe effective in preventing tropical macrocytic anaemia of latepregnancy. Folate was shown to be the crucial factor. In the1980s a series of studies showed how periconceptional folatecould prevent . . . [Full text of this article]

Richard Smith, editor

(rsmith@bmj.com)

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