Archive for the ‘Cardio & Blood-Cholesterol’ Category

REDUCING YOUR RISK OF CORONARY ARTERY DISEASE: EATING FOR BETTER HEALTH

Thursday, July 14th, 2011

Food choices are one of the most individual parts of your life-style. Even family members who eat most meals together choose different amounts and different combinations of food. There is an almost unlimited variety of foods that fit into a heart-healthy diet.
Medical experts have identified certain nutrient components of food—fat cholesterol, sodium, and calories— that relate to heart disease. Your doctor will probably discuss with you individual recommendations, in terms such as grams of fat, milligrams of cholesterol and sodium, etc. Sometimes it is difficult to take the next step of translating these recommendations into everyday food choices. Registered dietitians are available to help you take the next step. Your doctor can refer you to one for help. This section briefly reviews some common recommendations and then helps you pull these facts together into an overall plan for eating more healthfully.
Unfortunately, many people get discouraged by nutrition advice because they mistakenly think that they cannot eat their favorite foods. A more positive and encouraging approach is to consider that no food is forbidden. Good health comes from eating a variety of foods—meats, dairy products, and especially vegetables, fruits, and grains—in moderate amounts. You may have to change some of your routine grocery purchases, some of your cooking methods, and the amounts of some foods you are accustomed to eating, but you do not have to take the enjoyment out of eating. In fact, you will probably discover some new tastes, and your new eating habits can lead to improvement in the way you look and feel.
The following section reviews the most common recommendations about fat, cholesterol, sodium, and calories. The recommendations form the basis for practical changes in food selections you can try in your own meals.
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HEART ATTACK: SOME EXPERIENCED SYMPTOMS

Saturday, May 28th, 2011

Some people may experience minor persistent symptoms that precede and herald their heart attacks. Such symptoms may include a recurring pain in the chest, neck, elbow, or even wrist or back that comes on with exertion or even at rest. The pain may have the quality of a minor toothache or pressure. The clue that something important may be happening is simple: this is usually a new experience, different from any other discomforts that the person has felt before.
Some people feel embarrassed about going to a doctor for fear that he will find nothing wrong. This is wrong in itself. It takes many years of training for a doctor to learn to make a diagnosis accurately, so certainly the average person cannot be expected to be correct in the diagnosis of his own ailments even a fraction of the time. Another group of people tends to minimize all symptoms because they refuse to believe that they could possibly be sick. They have done well for so many years that it is inconceivable to them that they could suffer from a heart attack. Vanity can become a treacherous assassin. The simple truth is that 50 percent of deaths in the United States today are caused by diseases of the heart and blood vessels, and heart attacks claim 55 percent of these deaths. It can happen to you and the chances are that it eventually will.
Many hospitals in the Western world have instituted new programs in an attempt to decrease the death rate from heart attacks. Intensive care units in modern hospitals have increased the patient survival rate. In several large cities in the
United States and England, mobile coronary care units have been established to provide patients with expert attendance during their transport from home to hospital. A recent study has shown, however, that the time required to take a patient from his home to the hospital is but a fraction of the time that is wasted between the onset of the attack and actual arrival at the hospital, where positive measures can be taken to save his life. The patient usually waits hours and sometimes a day or two before he believes that something is seriously wrong and summons help. Since the greatest risk of death occurs during the first few hours of a heart attack, with the probability of death decreasing rapidly after the first day or two, it is obvious that further significant improvement in survival rates depends upon the individual himself.
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TRANS FATTY ACIDS AND CARDIOVASCULAR SYSTEM

Tuesday, February 8th, 2011

Trans fatty acids have a harmful effect on the cardiovascular system. In order for fatty acids to be biologically useful, they have to be in what is called the ‘cis’ form. Once they are processed, they may lose their ‘cis’ form and become ‘trans’.
Once they are trans they behave like saturated fats. Not only that, but they actually compete with cis-linoleic acid and so inhibit its metabolism.
People in industrialized countries eat on average 6-12g of trans fatty acids a day and these fatty acids are found in substantial amounts in human tissues.
Apart from acting as a blocking agent in the metabolic pathway of linoleic acid, trans fatty acids are also known to raise cholesterol levels. So taking large quantities of trans fatty acids over a long period of time is likely to have harmful effects on anyone who is a candidate for cardiovascular disease.
Evening primrose oil can by-pass the block created by trans fatty acids and can also help to lower cholesterol. However, it is far better to take evening primrose oil as part of a diet low in saturated fat and trans fatty acids.
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TRANS FATTY ACIDS AND CARDIOVASCULAR SYSTEM
Trans fatty acids have a harmful effect on the cardiovascular system. In order for fatty acids to be biologically useful, they have to be in what is called the ‘cis’ form. Once they are processed, they may lose their ‘cis’ form and become ‘trans’.Once they are trans they behave like saturated fats. Not only that, but they actually compete with cis-linoleic acid and so inhibit its metabolism.People in industrialized countries eat on average 6-12g of trans fatty acids a day and these fatty acids are found in substantial amounts in human tissues.Apart from acting as a blocking agent in the metabolic pathway of linoleic acid, trans fatty acids are also known to raise cholesterol levels. So taking large quantities of trans fatty acids over a long period of time is likely to have harmful effects on anyone who is a candidate for cardiovascular disease.Evening primrose oil can by-pass the block created by trans fatty acids and can also help to lower cholesterol. However, it is far better to take evening primrose oil as part of a diet low in saturated fat and trans fatty acids.
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