Hot food based on people's belief

Functional or nutraceuticals foods are known as food-drugs which have therapeutic effects in prevention and treatments of various kinds of degenerative diseases and cancers. The consumption of bioactive compounds of different food sources according to the intrinsic temper, lifestyle, physical and psychological body function and also the principles of traditional sciences, can be beneficial in the control of chronic disorders and economical costs. So, in this study, we assessed beliefs and attitudes of people about food-drug properties of diet, based on their hot or cold effects. In this cross-sectional study, 700 household Isfahanian women were selected by systematic cluster sampling methods, between April and Febrary Of 2012. The beliefs and attitudes of them about food properties were asked by questionnaire and then they compared to the key references of Traditional Medicine such as “Law in Medicine”, “Alshamel fi alsanaet altaiebeh” and “Makhzan aladvieh”. Data were analyzed by Crosstab and McNemar test with SPSS software, version 20. Data showed that 30 mentioned types of food items and products were briefly from spice and seasonings, fruits, meat types, various kinds of simple carbohydrate sources and sweets. The comparison shows that approximately 50 percents of women’s beliefs were similar to the documents of traditional sciences. The assessment of the agreement percent between food item's properties and documents shows that focus on enhancing the education and recognition about food-drug properties are necessary for women as responsible of family feeding in order to disease prevention, control and treatment.