In my daily medical practice I discuss diet as an intervention to help or reverse disease. Surprisingly, very few people see the connection between food and disease. Even fewer people are willing to make changes in their diet. Recently I made a long trip to Colorado and spent 18 hours driving. I listened to a bunch of podcasts including two episodes about the role of keto diet in treating mental health diseases:
Iain Campbell and Mark Hyman talking about: “Is Bipolar Disorder Really a Diet Problem?”
Georgia Ede, Brian Lenzkes and Tro Kalayjian talking about: “Feeding the Brain: Nutrition and Mental Health”
The case they make is that many medications used to treat mental health conditions are also anti-seizure medications. Keto diet has been used to treat seizures, so why not use it to treat mental health conditions. There are many success stories. It is extremely impressive that it can work even in some cases of schizophrenia:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30962118/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35873236/
I think keto diet is a safe diet in most people. There is very little to lose in trying the keto diet for 2-3 months.
The most remarkable transformation I have seen with diet was the case of Terry Wahls who reversed the symptoms of severe multiple sclerosis with diet and other interventions. You can see her story in this presentation. So far I have not found anybody with multiple sclerosis willing to go this far to treat their multiple sclerosis. It is pretty mind blowing that even a severe condition like multiple sclerosis is not enough to push people to try significant life style changes.
The connection between diet and health is nothing new. My grandparents knew it. In the book “The Omnivore's Dilemma” Michael Pollan cites Albert Howard (who lived in the 1930s-1940s) : "Artificial manures (synthetic fertilizers) lead inevitably to artificial nutrition, artificial food, artificial animals and finally to artificial men and women.”
It is not far fetched to believe that some of the thousands of chemicals in our food chain can have an impact on our health. The impact can manifest in different ways depending on our genetic background and other environmental factors.