What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Best?• Here are some of medical science's most overlooked surprises of nutrition that helps heart health to prevent cardiovascular disease, heart disease and stroke. What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Surprise # 1:Most Overlooked: Vitamins K and Vitamin DThe commonly used anticoagulant drug coumadin interferes with the metabolism and function of Vitamin K by inhibiting the enzymes needed to produce Vitamin K.• This drug can produce excessive bleeding and does produce progressive widespread calcification of arteries and the aorta. Why Do You Need Enough Vitamin K?Lack of Vitamin K2 causes calcium to fail to be deposited in bones where it belongs and to be deposited instead in arteries, aorta, soft tissues including muscle, breast, kidneys and in heel spurs.• Hardening of the arteries is caused when calcium enters the arteries, and lesions are formed that lead to the degeneration associated with heart disease. (Cees Vermeer, Laviena Braam et al Vitamin K supplementation: A simple way to bone and cardiovascular health, AgroFOOD industry hi-tech, Nov/Dec 2003 17-20) • About Vitamin K and Vitamin D & Dementia Your Heart & Diabetics Need Vitamin DPeople who are LOW in their dietary intake of vitamin D are more susceptible to developing cardiovascular disease. (Circulation, the journal of the American Heart Association, January 2008)• Low levels of vitamin D are now known to nearly DOUBLE the risk of heart disease in patients with diabetes. • Diabetics deficient in vitamin D can’t process cholesterol normally, so it builds up in their blood vessels, increasing the risk of heart attack and stroke. • Dr. Carlos Bernal-Mizrachi, an endocrinologist at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis found that a good supply of vitamin D is needed to prevent cholesterol from building up in your blood vessels, particularly people with diabetes. • How Much Vitamin D do I Need? What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Surprise # 2:Diet = Cholesterol Lowering DrugsDetermining what nutrition helps heart health best has some surprises, especially how quickly a change in nutrition helps heart health.A team or researchers at the University of Toronto set out to determine how nutrition helps heart health. To their surprise they found that adopting a simple diet of only fruit, vegetables and nuts can be effective in reducing the risk of heart disease in just one week! Dubbing it the "Garden of Eden" diet for its simplicity, the researchers found that this diet acts exactly like a cholesterol-lowering drug. They reported that this “Garden of Eden” diet lowered serum LDL-cholesterol in healthy volunteers by over 30%, which is equivalent to the effects of first generation statins, the standard cholesterol-lowering medications. Of course there are “side benefits” of better health rather than possible "side effects" of statins (atorvastatin (Lipitor), pravastatin (Pravachol), simvastatin (Zocor), lovastatin (Mevacor), rosuvastatin (Crestor) and fluvastatin (Lescol) which include muscle weakness, loss of balance, increased risk of falling and memory loss. See: Garden of Eden Diet, University of Toronto What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Surprise # 3:Not Low-Fat But Better FatsContrary to decades of low-fat advice, research results are overwhelming, showing that the Mediterranean-style diet enriched with walnuts or olive oil will indeed reduce heart disease.In a landmark study because of its size, duration and clinical basis, researchers answered what nutrition helps heart health best, finding the Mediterranean diet better than a low-fat diet. In an article entitled “Effects of a Mediterranean-Style Diet on Cardiovascular Risk Factors,” reported in the Annals of Internal Medicine, the researchers found that: HIGH-RISK PARTICIPANTS WHO IMPROVED THEIR DIET WITH VEGETABLES, LEGUMES, OLIVE OIL OR NUTS, ESPECIALLY WALNUTS • showed lower blood pressure, • improved lipid profiles, • decreased insulin resistance and • reduced concentrations of inflammatory molecules compared with those allocated to a low-fat diet of the American Heart Association guidelines. EAT AN AVOCADO A DAY! Avocados are another surprise of how high-fat nutrition helps heart health! An experimental trial had women eating an avocado a day to see what nutrition helps heart health. Ironically, even though their total fat consumption was up to 37% of calories, their total cholesterol, LDL and lipoprotein apo B lowered significantly. By contrast, when these same women were put on a diet with only 20% of calories from fat, and no avocado, they showed a smaller, less significant drop in total cholesterol, with only the protective HDL being lower! The Healthiest Diet in the World, (p. 310) What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Surprise # 4:Most Overlooked Protective Heart NutrientPeople in danger of, or with diagnosed heart problems who want extra protection will want to know how to enhance their glutathione levels with nutrition.Why raise your level of glutathione? Scientists are reporting that levels of glutathione are more predictive of heart disease than cholesterol levels, with higher levels of glutathione being more protective. Glutathione levels diminish due to aging, stress and illness. When the protective protein glutathione (GSH) is low, heart attacks occur, so that using a heart nutrition supplement that enhances glutathione is a good protective strategy. See Study: New England Journal of Medicine See also: GSH, Glutathione Deficiency = Stronger Predictor Than High Cholesterol. No, there are not routine tests yet, but there soon will be, says glutathione expert, Dr. Jimmy Gutman, a glutathione expert: "there is mounting evidence that high levels of glutathione are protective of heart disease, heart attacks and strokes." • The best strategy is to use nutritonal pre-cursors, or nutraceutical that has been clinically proven to improve glutathione levels, because taking glutathione pills is not effective. • A nutraceutical is a supplement or a food that has been clinically proven to do what it says it does, and can be listed in the Physician's Desk Reference, alongside pharmacueticals. Ask Us for Recommendations for Improving GlutathioneWhat Nutrition Helps Heart Health Surprise # 5:Eat Your Spinach For Stroke Recovery!Why always eat your leafy greens and berries, especially you have had a stroke?Because dietary supplementation with blueberries and spinach, has been found to significantly reduce ischemic brain damage from strokes! Dr. P. Bickford showed that nutritional supplementation reversed normal age-related declines in memory and learning in old rats. • “I was amazed at the extent of neuroprotection these diets provided,” said Dr. Bickford, a researcher at the USF Center for Aging and Brain Repair and James A. Haley Veterans’ Hospital. • “The size of the stroke was 50 to 75 percent less in rats treated with diets supplemented with blueberries, spinach or spirulina before the stroke.” There have certainly been an abundance of studies showing QUERCETIN-RICH FOODS like onions, apples, red wine, broccoli and to have a protective effect against heart disease, and of course, some cancers! • AND EATING YOUR SPINACH, AN ONION AND "AN APPLE A DAY" is not so bad as nutrition helps heart health. What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Surprise # 6:Nutrition's A Package Deal, not Just A PillTeasing out just which beneficial chemicals in the blueberries and leafy greens might be reproduced therapeutically in pill form, is difficult, Dr. Bickford said:• “Whole foods contain multiple nutrients, so there are many different ways these diets could be protecting the heart and the brain.” • “From a scientific perspective how nutrition helps heart health is a package deal in food,” and is better than isolated nutritional supplements for preventing a heart attack and strokes. • Even though supplements are essential at times to prevent deficiencies, especially of vitamins B, and of D in Northern climates, food is always your first medicine. What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Surprise # 7:Whole Grains Are Proven Against Heart AttacksWHOLE GRAINS have been found to reduce both heart disease and the insulin resistance related to diabetes, weight gain and high blood pressure.(Liese AD, Roach AK, Sparks KC, et al. in their Insulin Resistance Atherosclerosis Study. Am J Clin Nutr 2003;78:965–71) Whole grains were found best by Fung and Hu who studied 15,792 adults over 11 years. • Researching how nutrition helps heart health, they showed that consumption of whole grains was protective against coronary heart disease and heart attacks in all races, while fruit and vegetable intake was protective in African–Americans but not in whites, and no dietary pattern appeared protective against stroke. (Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities, AJCN) What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Surprise # 7:Fish Sticks are Not On the "good food" ListFish is usually recommended, but here is some bad news for lovers of fried fish and tuna sandwiches, because "All fish meals may not be equal," says Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian of the Harvard Medical School.Mozaffarian examined ultrasound images of the hearts of 5,000 older Americans who were given a questionnaire about their diets. After accounting for other factors that play a role in heart disease -- including other foods -- he found that people who regularly consumed broiled or baked fish were more likely to have a lower heart rate and blood pressure, and better blood flow to the heart that prevents heart attacks. • In contrast, those who regularly consumed fried fish or fish sandwiches showed signs of hardening arteries and other cardiac problems. • The bottom line of what nutrition helps heart health, remains to 'Eat more fish!' (broiled or baked, that is) What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Surprise # 8:Good Food for the Heart, Not Just Vitamin SupplementsVitamin-rich foods, but NOT vitamin supplements, have more consistently been shown to have beneficial effects, according to a population-based study of antioxidants, appearing in the June 26, 2002, Journal of the American Medical Association, (JAMA) on nutritional supplements.Apart from taking a good multiple vitamin and mineral supplement for the folate, the vitamin B, selenium, and vitamin D, eating foods rich in micronutrients is best. • The best protection is by eating nuts, leafy green vegetables and foods and spices rich in antioxidants and vitamin E. These not also reduce risk of heart attacks and strokes, but they have also been associated with reduced risk of Alzheimer's. Tip: Snack On Walnuts to Reduce RiskGrabbing a handful of walnuts instead of that afternoon cookie will help reduce your risk of a heart attack.An ever-growing body of research has shown that walnuts lower cholesterol, reduce inflammation and improve arterial function. The omega-3 fatty acids in walnuts are converted to the same type as marine sources, and have a similar effect on inflammation. Reducing inflammation is believed to decrease the build-up of plaque in the arteries, or of arteriosclerosis. • Knowing what nutrition helps heart health and having a bag of walnuts handy for snacks is much easier than a can of sardines or a salmon sandwich in your purse or briefcase! Links for Heart Health Nutrition• Simple and Best Heart Disease Prevention Diet • New Antioxidants Found Against Heart Disease and Cancer • Medical Heart Health Discoveries: Nutrition v.s. Meds? • Why Antacid Drugs are Bad for your Heart • Nutrition of Meds for High Blood Pressure? • How High Blood Pressure Can Make You Fat • Avoiding Hypertension Meds with Diet & Nutrition • Which Fats Are Best for Fat Loss & Healthy Heart? • QUIZ: Which Fats are Healthy and Which Fats Deadly? What Nutrition Helps Heart Health Best: Vitamin Supplements and Foods for Heart Disease PreventionGo to HOME PAGE from What Nutrition Helps Heart Health
|
