You've likely read about former
president Bill Clinton's dramatic
heart-health makeover and about superstar Beyoncé's
substantial weight loss with a vegan diet -- but did you
know a plant-based prescription can be 20 times more powerful than today's
leading drugs in treating and reversing heart disease? With 1 in 6 cases of
heart disease that start in utero, and with a heart attack occurring every 45
seconds, it's never too late or too early to adopt a fiber-packed,
heart-healthful diet.
Here are five guidelines for optimal
heart health, released by cardiovascular disease researchers at the 2015
International Conference on Nutrition and Medicine:
1. Build your diet around
plant-based foods. All day, every day.
Make vegetables, beans, whole grains
and fruit the center of your diet -- all day, every day -- to see positive changes
in five metabolic risk factors: body weight, waist circumference, blood sugar,
blood pressure and total cholesterol.
Plant-based vegan diets boost
post-meal calorie burn, explaining why those who adopt this approach experience
the largest net weight loss, compared to those who chose pescatarian,
vegetarian or omnivorous fare. This style of eating also reduces the risk of an
early death and certain forms of cancer, and prolongs the early onset of
Alzheimer's disease.
2. Minimize refined grains, added
salt and sweeteners; instead, opt for fresh fruit and vegetables.
Instead of reaching for foods packed
with sodium and refined sugar, which forces your heart to beat harder, simply
reach for fresh fruit and vegetables. Foods rich in vitamin C reduce
inflammation in the body, curbing the risk of cardiovascular disease and an
early death by 15 and 20 percent, respectively. To reap the benefits, try a cup
of oranges, strawberries, red pepper sticks, pineapple chunks, cooked broccoli
or Brussels sprouts, which all provide close to 100 percent of daily vitamin C
values for children and adults.
Caldwell Esselstyn, director of the
cardiovascular prevention and reversal program at the Cleveland Clinic,
recommends consuming even more to reverse heart disease: six servings of
steamed leafy greens each day. The restorative properties are vast, and studies
show heart attack survivors who adopt a high-fiber diet increase their risk of
survival by 40 percent.
3. Include some nuts and seeds;
avoid oils.
Nuts and seeds offer heart-healthful
benefits, thanks to their nutrient density: They provide fiber,
vitamin E, plant sterols, L-arginine, polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats
and omega-3-fatty acids. This nutrition squad teams up to transport bad
cholesterol away from the body, attack plaque buildup, which can lead to a
heart attack or stroke, and provide nourishment for a strong arterial wall.
Use just a small amount a few times
each week, and go to the original source -- flax seeds vs. flaxseed oil --
since nuts are a high-calorie food. One to 1.5 ounces, the size of your palm,
provides roughly 250 calories and is all you'll need to reap the
heart-healthful benefits. Try crushing a handful of nuts or seeds in your palm
and use to top salads, soups or breakfast bowls.
4. Avoid foods containing trans and
saturated fats.
Avoiding trans fats shouldn't be too
hard since the Food and Drug Administration is phasing out this type of
artery-clogging fat, which remains solid at room temperature. Trace amounts
will likely remain in margarine, coffee creamers, chicken wings, pastries,
crackers, chips and most packaged and prepared food items, another reason to
steer clear of highly processed foods. In addition to altering cholesterol
ratios, trans fats promote inflammation, laying the groundwork for obesity, heart disease,
cancer and stroke.
The Nurse's Health Study finds women
who consume the most trans fats, an average of 3.6 grams per day -- what you'll
find in a double quarter-pounder with cheese and a small vanilla milkshake --
triple their risk for an immediate heart
attack.
Saturated fats, also solid at room
temperature, are found in high amounts in animal products and certain vegetable
oils. This type of fat poses significant heart-health risks: For every 1
percent increase in energy from saturated fat intake, LDL cholesterol
concentration, the undesirable type
of cholesterol, increases by about 2 percentage points. The leading
sources in the American diet are cheese, pizza, dairy- and grain-based desserts
and chicken, followed by processed meats -- sausage, franks, bacon, ribs,
burgers -- and Mexican mixed dishes.
5. Have a reliable source of vitamin
B12.
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Adults and children over the age of
14 should consume 2.4 mcg of vitamin B12 each day, through fortified foods,
including nondairy beverages, supplements or multivitamins. Women who are
pregnant or breast-feeding should consume 2.6 and 2.8 mcg, respectively.
Overall, you can't go wrong with
colorful plant-based fare.
It's precision medicine at its finest: a remedy that's proven time and time
again, across all DNA profiles, to offer immediate health benefits and
significantly reduce the risk of chronic disease.
Let's make this the year we let our
forks determine our genetic destiny, especially when it comes to securing our
fate for the leading cause of death worldwide
Why You’ll Feel Flawless Eating Like Beyoncé
Swapping out animal products for plant-based foods makes your chance of having a heart attack or dying from heart disease extremely slim. .
Beyonce recently launched a vegan meal delivery service, 22 Days Nutrition.
By Julieanna Hever
+ More
There's a certain shimmer
radiating from Beyoncé these days, and it isn't just her head-turning, hot-pink
shorts. Queen Bey is experiencing the virtues of a plant-based diet –
delicious food, more energy, better sleep and a "noticeable glow" to
her skin. She wants the whole world to feel these things, too, which is why she
launched a vegan meal delivery service, 22 Days Nutrition, with husband and
hip-hop mogul Jay-Z this past February.
"We should spend more time loving
ourselves, which means taking better care of ourselves with good nutrition
and making healthier food choices," Beyoncé recently told The
New York Times. "The benefits of a plant-based diet need to be
known." While the power couple doesn't eat exclusively vegan fare, they do
– as their personal trainer says – "lean toward it."
No matter what you think of her music,
there are plenty of reasons we all may want to lean toward this way of eating.
Studies show that the more plant-based foods and the fewer animal products we
consume, the healthier we'll be. And the advantages go far beyond improved
energy, sleep and skin.
For starters, ditching meat, eggs and dairy
virtually eliminates the risk for coronary artery disease, America's number one
killer. That's right – swapping out animal products for plant-based foods
makes your chance of having a heart attack or dying from heart disease
extremely slim. In fact, those with advanced-stage heart disease can
actually reverse the illness by making this switch. No other way of eating has
ever been shown to do that.
According to the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention, heart disease alone causes 1 in every 4 deaths in the
United States. Treating the disease accounts for $1 out of every $6 spent on
health care. Shielding ourselves from this illness is reason enough to try
leaning toward a plant-based diet.
But the same eating pattern that can
prevent and cure heart disease offers similar protections from nearly every
other leading killer in America. Cutting out animal products sharply reduces
the risk for obesity, hypertension, stroke, Type 2 diabetes and some of the
most deadly types of cancer, including colorectal, prostate and breast cancer.
Scientists believe it also likely lowers the risk for Alzheimer's, a disease
that develops in the brain in much the same way as heart disease develops in
the arteries.
Of course, shaking up your meal plan to
feel better and live longer doesn't require signing up for Beyoncé's meal
delivery service. As a dietitian, I encourage my patients to think about ways
to make the foods they already know and love more healthful. For some, this
means loading up their plates with their favorite fruits, vegetables, beans,
nuts and grains. Others find it easier to replace animal-based foods with
plant-based meat and dairy products. Delicious, plant-based versions of
chicken, beef, pork and milk are now available in virtually all major grocery
chains, and with new products hitting store shelves all the time, it's never
been easier to throw vegetarian
chicken on a sandwich or chow down on meatless meatballs and spaghetti.
America's meat-heavy diet has led to a wide
range of debilitating health problems, not to mention forcing billions of pigs,
cows and chickens to endure miserable lives in cramped, filthy factory farms.
While they may have countless chart-topping songs between them, hearing pop
culture stars Beyoncé and Jay-Z advocate for a healthier, more compassionate
way of eating is the real music to our ears.
Julieanna Hever, MS, RD, CPT, Food Trends
Specialist at Mercy For Animals and host of the television show What Would Julieanna Do?, is a bestselling author, speaker, health and
fitness expert, and lifestyle coach.
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