| Nutrition and Dietary Factors
Dietary habits are a fundamental area where we can exert a great deal of influence on our heart health.
Fats. Lowering the level of dietary fat has been in the news for a long time now. The American Heart Association says that 30 percent or less of our total calories should be from fat. Many alternative practitioners advise even lower intakes because of some of the additional benefits, such as reduction of breast, ovarian, and uterine cancer risk.
In addition to amount of fat, the type of fat is also important. |
Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr., M.D.
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 But studies of those who live into their sixties and beyond have shown that despite the well-documented risk to heart health that is posed by smoking, they have no coronary artery disease.4 They are protected by their diet, which consists almost entirely of nineteen separate varieties of sweet potatoes.
Nutrition impinges on cardiovascular health in several critical ways. The most obvious, of course, is that a diet high in fat and cholesterol causes blood lipid levels to rise, thus setting off the process of plaque formation.
But isn't "dietary moderation" enough to stop that process? |
| This list, although it may not include many of the products you used to eat, permits you to fill your plate with a delicious and colorful array of foods brimming with fiber, nutrients, and antioxidants, all essential to heart health and overall well-being:
1. Vegetables. This is by no means a complete list, but it gives you a good sense of the wide variety of vegetables that you can eat. Sweet potatoes, yams, potatoes (but never French fried or prepared in any other way that involves adding fats!). Broccoli, kale, and spinach. Asparagus, artichokes, eggplant, radishes, celery, onions, carrots. |
| Is there anything else you need to consume to make sure you're on the right course for optimal heart health?
For those who have heart disease, I do recommend four dietary supplements. Some studies suggest that there may be new supplements to recommend in coming years; arginine, for instance, the amino acid that is so critical to the production of artery-expanding nitric oxide. However, my experience suggests that our patients are getting plenty of arginine through the plant-based foods they eat—especially legumes. |
Andreas Moritz
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 Besides, it increases muscle tone, lung capacity and heart health. During the panting phases, the body uses up its complex sugar reserves in the muscles. For those who desire weight loss, this method causes you to lose weight after exercising, as the body tries to replenish its lost sugar reserves by breaking down fat deposits while you are resting. Weight loss achieved during strenuous endurance exercise programs, on the other hand, tends to be reversed because the body tries to quickly replenish the lost fat deposits in order to prepare itself for the next energy-depleting round of exercise. |
Anne Harrington
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 A decade later, in 1998, "heart health" expert Dean Ornishpreviously best known for his success in reversing risk factors for heart disease with a strict low-fat diet—published a new self-help book called Love & Survival: The Scientific Basis for the Healing Power of Intimacy that elevated that advice into an entire program. Diet was still important in controlling heart disease, Ornish wrote, but it couldn't compare with love: "Love and intimacy are among the most powerful factors in health and illness," he declared. |
Bottom Line Health
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| Up to 75% of Americans are deficient in this vital mineral, which is needed for heart health and strong bones as well as for blood sugar control.
Helpful: Vegetables are among the richest sources of magnesium. Eat raw or lightly steamed vegetables—highly processed or overcooked veggies lose their magnesium content. Whole grains are also much richer sources of magnesium than refined grains.
•Calcium. Many experts advocate the green, leafy vegetables for calcium, but these foods do not provide ample amounts of this mineral in a bioavailable form. |
Jonny Bowden, Ph.D., C.N.S.
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 Cardiovascular Health
Vitamin C also plays an important role in heart health. For one thing, it prevents oxidation (remember the apple) of LDL (the poorly named "bad" cholesterol). The thing about cholesterol is that it really isn't a problem until it gets oxidized (and then it's a really big problem). By helping to prevent this, vitamin C helps prevent problems that might be related to cholesterol. Vitamin C also strengthens collagen structures of the arteries.
And if that weren't enough, it can also benefit anyone with hypertension. Why? |
| But for the same reason that it helps with those annoying conditions, it is also a terrific nutrient for the heart, and should be included in any natural supplement program for heart health, congestive heart failure, recovery from heart attacks, and the prevention of arrhythmias.
5-HTP for Depression
CONSIDER THIS: You're lying on the couch, unable to motivate yourself enough to get up and get dressed. Everything seems pointless, hopeless, and dark, and all you want to do is stare into space. |
| Here's how the media reported the findings: "Antioxidants do not protect high-risk women from heart disease" (Fox News), "Antioxidants don't lower heart risk" (WebMD), "Vitamins No Magic Bullet for Heart Health" (ABC News), and "Common Vitamins No Help for Women's Hearts" (Reuters).
Hidden Beneath the Headlines
Sounds pretty bad, doesn't it?
Here's what was buried in the data: Vitamin E led to a 22 percent reduction in the risk of heart attack. It also led to a 27 percent reduction in the risk for stroke. |
| Omega-3 fatty acids are the kind of fats that can help lower blood pressure the most and improve overall heart health to boot. And especially in people with high blood pressure, vitamin C improves endothelial dysfunction (a dysfunction of the cells that line the inner surface of all blood vessels) in people with hypertension.
A diet high in fruits and vegetables can do wonders for high blood pressure. So can certain foods. Celery, for example (see page 186) can lower blood pressure when you con- O sume four sticks a day, as can garlic. |
| And it has a long and impressive resume when it comes to heart health largely for its role in managing blood lipid profiles, a key strategy for the maintenance of cardiovascular health.
As of this writing, mainstream medicine still sees the cholesterol story this way: Excess amounts of LDL, or "bad cholesterol," cling to the walls of arteries. Over time, a buildup of these deposits, called plaque, will narrow the arteries and restrict blood flow to the heart. Heart disease and heart attacks are often a result of the restricted blood flow caused by the plaque. |
Kaayla T. Daniel, PhD, CCN
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 And because science is a sound basis for marketing strategy, the industry has put millions into medical research, including a meta-analysis funded by Protein Technologies International to establish the FDA's cholesterol-lowering heart health claim. The United Soybean Board's "Soy Health Research Program" helps researchers prepare
POISONOUS PLANT DATABASE
While the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a heart health claim for soy protein, the agency also lists soy in its "Poisonous Plant Database. |
Wendy Bazilian, DRPH, MA, RD, Steven Pratt, MD, Kathy Matthews
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 At the same time, they can help lower blood pressure, promote heart health, and even play a role in preventing damage to your skin from the sun's ultraviolet rays. Polyphenols are also powerful anti-inflammatories and we know there's a strong connection between obesity and inflammation: If you are obese your body is inflamed. The piolyphenols fight that inflammation. Other research has shown that the theanine in green tea may play a role in reducing stress,5 which we are learning can be a powerful promoter of weight gain. |
| Soy protein seems to boost heart health by contributing to lower blood pressure and playing a small role in lowering cholesterol in an overall cholesterol-reducing diet.35 Soy has also been shown to possibly
If you have been diagnosed with breast or prostate cancer, discuss the role of soy contribute to reducing cancer risk, reducing risk of bone fracture or osteoporosis, and better managing diabetes. |
C. W. Randolph, M.D.
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 Bio-identical progesterone replacement is also good for heart health. Because heart disease is the number one killer of women in America, the effect of progesterone on cardiac health has been an area of extensive research. You will recall that the Women's Health Initiative trial indicated that synthetic estrogen plus progestin increased cardiac risk. The good news is that researchers have proven that a hormone replacement regimen consisting of both bio-identical estrogen and bio-identical progesterone serves to reduce coronary vascular activity. |
David W. Grotto, RD, LDN
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 The American Cancer Society states that apricots and other foods rich in carotenes may lower the risk of cancers of the larynx, esophagus, and lungs. heart health: Patients who had the lowest level of beta-carotene intake had almost twice the risk of having a heart attack compared to those with the highest intake. Those with the highest intake of beta-carotene had about one-third the risk of suffering a heart attack and about one-half the risk of dying from it if they did have one. |
Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr., M.D.
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| It provides all the fat you need without giving you the extra doses that wreak such havoc with your heart health.
And this diet will not cause a protein deficiency. Typically, the Western diet contains an excess of protein—especially animal protein. The nutrition plan I recommend provides a variety of healthy plant proteins, somewhere between 50 and 70 grams every day. That is entirely adequate for a healthy lifestyle.
Could a low cholesterol level be dangerous for my health? |
Hyla Cass
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 Controlling homocysteine levels in the body is an important part of heart health.
Homocysteine affects the walls of arteries in at least four ways:
1. By doing direct damage to the cells that line the arteries, making them vulnerable to the formation of plaque, scab-like growths on the inner artery wall that can slow or stop blood flow to the heart.
2. By affecting the "tightness" and flexibility of blood vessels. |
Stephen T. Sinatra, M.D.
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 This "triad" is not only remarkably effective in preserving heart health, but is also outstanding in the treatment of neuromuscular diseases, such as fibromyalgia, that are also affected by failures in cellular energy metabolism. |
Elaine Magee
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 It could have something to do with olive oil's 30-plus phytochemicals, many of which have antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties that help promote heart health and protect against cancer.
ENJOY OLIVE OIL AT ITS BEST
Choose extra-virgin olive oil, the least processed form, to get the highest levels of these protective plant compounds. Light olive oil is lighter in flavor and color and better for baking or recipes where the distinctive olive oil flavor isn't desired. But the process of making the olive oil light removes many of the protective phytochemicals. |
| Garlic with onions improves heart health. Organosulfur compounds are the primary active phytochemicals in garlic and onions, and several of them may protect the heart by helping to keep arteries flexible and clear of plaque damage. For example, DADS (diallyl disulfide) has been shown to possess the strongest antioxidant activity that can prevent oxidation of LDL cholesterol in the bloodstream; another compound, SEC (sethylcysteine), has demonstrated great antiglycation activity. |
Hyla Cass
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| D-Ribose
While we're on the topic of heart health, I'd like to introduce one of my favorite supplements, D-ribose. It works by helping your heart cells to produce energy. Just think of it: your heart muscle is beating at least sixty times a minute, twenty-four hours a day, three hundred sixty-five days a year. It never rests! So it has to be supplied with a continuous and reliable source of fuel.
Energy is made in the hundreds of mitochondria that live in each heart cell: it burns the food we eat, and gives off energy in the form of ATP. |
Gabriel Cousens
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 Nuts and seeds are also high in plant sterols (phytosterols), which decrease cholesterol and improve heart health.64'65 In the intestinal lumen, phytosterols displace cholesterol and inhibit cholesterol absorption.66
Nuts and seeds are great for plain eating, and for making pates, soups, salad dressings, and nut mylks. When you see the nut mylk recipes in Chapter 6, you will wonder what you were ever doing with cow, soy, and rice milk. The anti-diabetogenic and nutritional benefits of nuts and seeds are worth knowing. |
David Winston, RH(AHG), and Steven Maimes
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 The doctor and the patient also monitored his sleep patterns, heart health, C-reactive protein and other markers, and joint health. The joints looked about the same after ten months of feeling "on top of the world," though hiking mainly in the rolling foothills. He continues to thrive and plans to stay on the adaptogens indefinitely.
From Alan Tillotson's Case Files—Shilajit for Dysentery
Alan Tillotson, PhD, RH(AHG), is a brilliant ayurvedic-trained herbalist and the author of The One Earth Herbal Sourcebook.
There are situations where adaptogens do more than relieve minor health problems. |
Hyla Cass
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| Q10, an antioxidant and heart health promoter (more on this nutrient in Chapter 4).
?1 gram (1,000 mg) of fish oil, twice daily, to supply omega-3 fatty
1 TABLE 2.1. RECOMMENDED DAILY MULTIVITAMIN AND MINERAL FORMULA 1
Nutrient
Daily Dose
About This Nutrient
Vitamin A
20.000 IU, at least 10,000 of which should be mixed carotenes
Fat-soluble vitamin needed for eyes and nervous system. Carotenes are powerful antioxidants, and many can be transformed into vitamin A in the body as needed. |
Stephen T. Sinatra, M.D.
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| Too many dietary supplements—claiming to treat everything from heart health to weight loss to male sexual enhancement—have hit the market with major media campaigns, plenty of claims, and a host of promises, with little, if any, science behind them. There can be no doubt that this "hype versus science" attitude in the nutritional supplement industry has placed major roadblocks in the path of acceptance of those natural therapies that do have solid science and demonstrable clinical benefit, and has encouraged many more-than-skeptical attitudes among healthcare providers. |
| It's these combinations of heart health effects that suggest L-carnitine is a "home run player" in the management of cardiac risk, angina, and ischemic heart disease.
I just want to emphasize that carnitine's mode of action differs from that of other anti-anginal agents which cardiologists use. Like coenzyme Q10 and D-ribose, L-carnitine can safely and effectively be taken in combination with beta blockers, calcium channel blockers, nitrates, and ACE inhibitors, for a more full-spectrum approach to symptom relief. |
Hyla Cass
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| For example, widely prescribed statin drugs, such as Crestor and Lipitor, block the activity of an enzyme that creates cholesterol in the body—but this action depletes the body of a substance called coenzyme Q10, which is vital for heart health.
Enzyme
A protein that accelerates the rate of chemical reactions, without being damaged or changed by the reactions.
Increased loss of nutrients through the urinary system. Any drug that causes an increase in urination can drain the body's levels of water-soluble nutrients, including B vitamins and minerals such as magnesium and potassium. |
| Besides their potential to cause damage to the heart and liver, other side effects include weight gain—sometimes, extreme weight gain—a common issue with any hypoglycemic drug; water retention (edema) that causes swelling and can contribute to heart failure; sizeable increase in "bad" LDL cholesterol (about 19 percent more than placebo), bad news for heart health; and a slight decrease in levels of hemoglobin, a protein that transports oxygen through the bloodstream—another factor that could cause stress to the heart.
A decision to use any medication is about balancing risks with benefits. |
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