While reading today's article, remember that heart disease is the #1
KILLER of people in today's modern world, with even higher death rates
than cancer! For some reason, most people don't seem to care about this
topic until it's too late and they have a heart attack even as early as their 30's or 40's.
It's
time people started taking heart health seriously before it's too
late. Unfortunately, most people don't think about something they can't
readily see or feel... after all, you can't "see" your artery health
every day like you can see how much body fat you have.
This
means that most people ignore their heart health until they actually
have a heart attack or even die. Even worse, I see so many people make
jokes about clogged arteries while eating junk food, saying things like "I'd rather enjoy life than worry about clogged arteries". Uh, sorry dude, but you can't enjoy life if you're DEAD!
And
do donuts and fried chicken REALLY equate to "enjoying life"? Not for
me! Enjoying life for me is skiing deep powder in the winter, hiking
beautiful mountains and enjoying nature in the summer, barreling down a
mountain biking trail on my bike, playing games and having laughs with
friends, and of course, enjoying some good aged cheese with a great red
wine (both of which by the way, can help to protect your arteries - even the cheese as explained in this article)
One
thing that sometimes wakes people up is to actually get an artery
calcification test and see how clogged their arteries already are. This
is a wake up call to many people and will spur them into finally caring
about their heart health before it's too late.
I mentioned
donuts and fried chicken above, which as you know, are obvious heart
cloggers due to the trans fats and refined inflammatory vegetable oils
used in making these...
But what about so-called "healthy" foods such as whole grains in relation to your heart health? Well...
Here's an excerpt from a great book I've been reading lately called The Great Cholesterol Myth by Dr. Stephen Sinatra and Dr Jonny Bowden...
"A
2010 study in the Archives of Internal Medicine demonstrated that women
who ate the highest amount of carbohydrates had a significantly greater
risk of coronary heart disease than those who ate the lowest amount,
and that carbohydrates from high-glycemic carbs were particularly
assiciated with significantly greater risk for heart disease"
As
you can see, they're seeing direct relationships between carbohydrate
consumption and heart disease. And as you know already from past issues
of this newsletter, natural saturated fat and dietary cholesterol
basically has NOTHING to do with heart disease at all. It's sugar,
overall high GI carbs, stress levels, and trans fats that appear to be
the MAIN culprits responsible for heart disease.
What about immediate effects on your heart from eating a high-carb meal?
In
the book, Dr Sinatra also discusses another research study done (at Tel
Aviv University's Sackler School of Medicine and the Heart Institute of
Sheba Medical Center) on the function of the endothelial walls of the
arteries before and after eating a dose of high GI carbs...
They
used something called brachial reactive testing to measure artery
functioning and gave groups high GI carbs such as corn flakes and sugar
(very much like the typical American breakfast) ... Dr Sinatra explains,
"Enormous peaks indicating arterial stress were found in the high GI groups: the cornflakes and sugar groups."
We're
not talking about artery damage here folks from saturated fat and
cholesterol like you've been led to believe... as you can see, this
study is showing direct damage to arteries from grains and sugar. Isn't
it sad that those cornflakes are advertised by the food conglomerates
as being a "wholesome and healthy" breakfast.
Dr Sinatra continues, "As
researchers from Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of
Public Health noted, quickly digested and absorbed carbs (i.e., those
with a high glycemic load) are associated with an increased risk of
heart disease."
Dr Sinatra and Dr Bowden also point out
studies that directly show that people who eat a higher glycemic load of
carbohydrates in their diets experienced higher CRP levels (C-reactive
protein), which is an indicator of overall inflammation in your body.
Higher CRP generally means higher risk for heart disease.
Check out the CRP differences they noted -- "...those
whose diets were lowest in glycemic load had an average CRP reading of
1.6, but those whose diets were highest in glycemic load had a CRP
reading more than 3x that amount (average measurement: 5.0 mg/L).
To give some perspective on CRP if you eat a truly healthy diet focusing on healthy proteins, lots of veggies, spices, teas, red wine,
and other antioxidants, and relatively low in overall carbohydrates...
I've had my CRP tested twice, and my results came in at 0.1 and 0.4,
indicating a VERY LOW amount of inflammation in my body as a whole.
Important Note:
my personal readings of total cholesterol are also always very high for
typical medical standards (total cholesterol usually in the low-mid
200's). Any normal doctor would immediately want try to be a drug
pusher and put me on statins, despite my very high and protective levels
of HDL (in the 60's), despite the fact that total cholesterol means
NOTHING to your overall heart disease risk, despite the fact that my
triglycerides are very low, and also despite the fact that my
inflammation levels are extremely low based on my CRP tests.
I
know this because one doctor tried to put me on statins 10 years ago
based solely on total cholesterol, but ignoring all of the other more
important tests such as HDL, triglycerides, and CRP levels. Obviously,
since I was more educated than he was on this topic, I chose to ignore
him, and follow people such as Dr Sinatra and Dr Bowden who clearly are
the top experts on heart health.
Speaking of triglycerides (and
also the different LDL particle types to pay attention to), I explain
all about both of those in this article:
How bread and cereal can CAUSE heart disease
What about the so-called "deadly" red meat in relation to heart disease?
I
get so sick of seeing groups with an agenda against eating animal
products trying to always lay the blame on red meat. Let's see what
true researchers such as Dr Sinatra and Dr Bowden have to say about the
research...
Keep in mind that most previous studies had never
separated processed meat (such as hot dogs, bologna, lunch meats with
chemical additives, etc) vs unprocessed meats (such as a healthy
grass-fed steak, pasture-raised pork tenderloin, grass-fed burger, etc)
in investigating the relationship between meat eating and heart disease.
But
Dr Sinatra and Dr Bowden reported on a Harvard study where researchers
analyzed 20 studies including over 1.2 million people in 10 countries
and they found... "each 1.8 oz daily serving of processed meat (about
one hot dog or a couple slices of deli meat) was associated with a 42%
higher risk of developing heart disease. In contrast, no relationship
was found between heart disease and nonprocessed red meat."
Also
remember that healthy grass-fed beef contains the unique fat called CLA
that has been shown to be a cancer-fighter as well as helping to aid
fat loss.
On this topic, watch this short video about the #1 food for a flat belly
Lastly,
remember that maintaining healthy blood pressure levels is also very
important for overall heart health. Sadly, there are many potential
dangers of blood pressure medications... watch this video below to see
some of the hazards of blood pressure drugs and alternative natural
remedies:
Possible DANGERS of blood pressure drugs (plus natural remedies for lowering blood pressure)
Mike Geary
Certified Nutrition Specialist
Certified Personal Trainer