Lifestyle Medicine: Working together to reverse the chronic disease epidemic in Latin America

Abstract

"Lifestyle Medicine" is revolutionizing health systems worldwide. This new field of medicine aims to reduce health costs, prevent diseases, and optimize therapeutic responses. In result, there is overall better quality of life for people. This new medical discipline includes everything related to lifestyles and the environment which has a strong evidence base, such as a healthy plant-based diets, exercise, stress management, cessation of tobacco and alcohol, adequate rest, healthy social relationships, emotional and spiritual health among others. Lifestyle Medicine modalities are used for preventing, and treating prevalent chronic diseases1,2. For many years, it has been known that there is a direct connection between chronic diseases and the lifestyles people choose. We now know that 80% of health expenditures are due to the management of chronic diseases. The good news is that close to 80% of chronic diseases are treatable and often reversible with lifestyle changes. The Latin American Association of Lifestyle Medicine along with the leading international organizations in Lifestyle Medicine are “working to deal with the causes ", that is, the true roots of diseases3 . An innovative and high-impact concept in terms of public health is the "Reversal of Chronic Diseases with Lifestyle Medicine", an inverse process to the pathophysiology of chronic diseases, with increasing scientific evidence available in recent years.