Nutrigenomics is the growing field of study that combines nutrition and how it relates to how our genes are expressed, particularly how it relates to the expression of hereditary or chronic diseases such as hypertension, heart disease, obesity, type 2 diabetes and others. There are nutritional factors to all of these diseases, and the theory behind nutrigenomics is that; nutrition is the one thing you can easily control, so it is a big factor that you should focus on when looking to prevent or help control these diseases. There are companies that analyze a sample of skin form the inside of your cheek and they will look at your DNA and tell you what diseases you might be susceptible to and what kind of diets or what kind of foods you can eat to help prevent these diseases form manifesting. How cool is that!? Of course this process isn’t fool proof or an end all to every disease, but it is a great start. It also brings up a lot of interesting questions or problems regarding ethics about your DNA. So the big question is, is it worth it?
Let’s say that an insurance company gets a hold of your DNA profile and refuses to insure you because you are highly susceptible to having heart disease, that doesn’t seem very fair. They can do that though, if they feel like they are going to risk loosing money by insuring you they don’t have to insure you. This is a problem. But, by getting the this test done you may be better off by knowing how to help combat or prevent your heart disease, at what cost though? Hopefully not the cost of having health insurance. This is a highly interesting field of study and a potentially lucrative field of study, and given all this and given all these controversies about it, is it even worth it? What if you would just eat right in the first place? I feel the saying “ignorance is bliss” applies to this situation; as long as you are consciously taking care of your body and eating the right things, do you really need to know what disease you are susceptible to getting?
by Peter Sloan
Epigenetics, particularly nutrigenomics, is really an interesting new frontier for the field of nutrition and dietetics. Since it's a newly formed field of study, nutrition and genetic schools haven't adapted their curriculum in supporting this new field. What do you think schools should implement in order nutrigenomics to be a forefront of nutrition intervention and therapy. In other words, what kind of classes should these schools create in order to support nutrigenomics?
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