Best Diet. Seven years in a row.

Do you think this suggests you should learn more and try it? I do!

US News and World Report has once again ranked the DASH Diet as the Best Diet. Despite being ranked as the Best Overall Diet for 7 years in a row now, they report it as still “relatively obscure”. My hope is that 2017 is the year that perception changes, and more realize it really is one of the best overall plans to eat for health. The Mediterranean Diet also ranked high, in the #2 spot (and perhaps more folks are at least familiar with the term) and the MIND diet (a blend of DASH and Mediterranean diets) also ranked well at #3. You could choose any of those three, but I have DASH Diet resources for you.

As co-author of DASH Diet For Dummies®, I couldn’t be more excited that it was not only rated Best Overall Diet, but also Best Diet for healthy living, diabetes, and heart health. 

DASH stands for Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension, and was originally created by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood institute to treat high blood pressure. The research says it works to lower blood pressure, but the heart-healthy diet plan has also been shown to be easy to follow, and helpful for weight control and diabetes.

US News comes up with this list each year, and they don’t do so randomly. They actually have a methodology and a broad panel experts. They consider:

  • How easy it is to follow
  • The diets ability to produce short-term and long-term weight loss
  • The nutritional completeness of the diet
  • Its safety
  • The potential for preventing and managing diabetes and heart disease.

If a diet plan is too difficult to adhere to long-term, it can’t have much benefit. Since diabetes and heart disease are leading health issues in the United States, it really is time to recommend DASH Diet to the masses.

The DASH Diet plan includes adding more fruits, veggies, dairy, nuts and seeds to your diet, and cutting back on meat, some fats, and salt. Use our For Dummies® Cheat Sheet handy as you set your goals. Better yet, go ahead and order our books! Such a small investment for a big impact on your health and lifestyle!