Eating a healthy diet, refusing processed foods, exercising and reducing alcohol consumption are more effective than drugs in preventing and fighting some diseases that affect the heart, especially in the case of young and middle-aged people with early symptoms, such as high blood pressure, according to a team of researchers at the University of California, San Francisco (United States).

A healthy lifestyle could prevent 26,000 cases of heart disease and prevent 2,900 heart-related deaths in ten years in the United States, estimate the authors of the study published in the journal.

DIET MAY REDUCE HEART DISEASE RISK EVEN FOR HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE

Modifying your diet is the smartest way to reduce your chance of heart disease, even if you already have high blood pressure. This means that basing your diet on vegetables, fat-free proteins, nuts, seeds, and whole grains is the best strategy for maintaining a healthy heart.

DIET MAY REDUCE HEART DISEASE RISK EVEN FOR HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE

Modifying your diet is the smartest way to reduce your chance of heart disease, even if you already have high blood pressure. This means that basing your diet on vegetables, fat-free proteins, nuts, seeds, and whole grains is the best strategy for maintaining a healthy heart.

MANY HEART DISEASES MAY BE PREVENTED

Nearly nine million middle-aged Americans, ages 35 to 64, suffer from early-stage hypertension that is not being treated, researchers estimate. Unless they make lifestyle changes, your heart disease can develop and become more serious, possibly even ending in a heart attack or stroke.

In Spain it is estimated that 42% of the population over 18 years of age suffers from high blood pressure, of which 37.4% are undiagnosed and probably do not consciously take any preventive measures. Early-stage hypertension is defined as a systolic pressure (top number) greater than 139 mmHg or a diastolic reading (bottom number) greater than 80-89 mmHg.

LOW-CARBOHYDRATE DIET FOR THE HEART

Other scientific work reveals that a low-carbohydrate diet can reduce the risk of heart disease. Not only that, but it can replace statin treatment to achieve a significant decrease in bad blood cholesterol levels.

According to the article by Drs. Benjamin Bikman of Brigham Young University, Benjamin T. Bikman and Paul Mason, a proper diet is the best way to control risk factors for heart disease. In his view, taking statins to lower LDL levels can backfire and is not necessary if you follow a low-carb diet.

The current theory about heart health is based on the false notion that a high-fat diet is the main cause of cardiovascular disease because it increases levels of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), which causes atherosclerosis or narrowing of the arteries.

THE REAL CULPRIT IS SUGAR

One of the first clues that the theory was false emerged when researchers monitored people with familial hypercholesterolemia (FH), a genetic tendency toward high LDL cholesterol levels. Although they expected mortality levels for FH patients to increase as their LDL levels increased, CVD deaths decreased with age, regardless of LDL profile.

According to the most recent studies, the real culprit is sugar and especially a diet of highly processed foods and drinks with added sugars. Maintaining a low-carb diet, in which these foods are limited or even eliminated, is the best way to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease.

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