Diet is a significant contributing factor to heart attacks. Did you know that the food you eat will influence or trigger one of many risk factors linked to heart disease? Let’s delve deeper, and understand how dietary approaches to heart attack prevention are an important and critical part of treatment. This is applicable as part of treatment post heart attacks and also as a pre-emptive method.
How does diet contribute to heart attack?
The food you consume daily, can impact your cholesterol levels, blood pressure, weight, and blood sugar levels. These, in turn contribute to risk of heart attack, by gradually building up conditions that can cause a heart attack. This makes dietary approaches to heart attack prevention a key factor in the fight against heart ailments.
This is how the health of your heart is affected by the food that you consume.
1. Saturated Fat, Trans Fat – When you consume red meat, full-fat dairy products, butter, processed and fried foods, it builds up saturated and trans-fat. This causes an increase in LDL cholesterol levels, that, in turn results in the buildup of plaques. The effects of such a buildup of plaques is arteries is atherosclerosis.
2.Sodium – When there is excessive consumption of processed foods, canned soups, snacks etc., your sodium levels increase. This will raise blood pressure levels, causing increased strain on the heart and risk of heart disease.
3.Sugar – Your intake of sugary drinks, sweets, baked and processed snacks contribute to higher sugar intake. This is a leading cause of obesity, insulin resistance, and elevated triglycerides. All of these are contributing factors to the risk of heart disease.
4.Fiber – It is important to have the right intake of fiber. For example, your diet should contain adequate portions of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, and nuts. When your diet is low in fiber it can result in higher cholesterol levels. It can also make it difficult to control blood sugar levels.
What are the best foods to prevent heart attack?
As part of dietary approaches to heart attack prevention, you could plan a diet chart. This will help ensure that you have heart healthy food as part of your daily diet. Here is what you need to include in your daily diet. This is the category of ingredients that you need to include. Make your choices of ingredients as per your preferences within these suggested categories.
- Fruits and Vegetables – Include lots of fruits and vegetables to supply your body with essential nutrients and antioxidants. This will protect the heart and lower blood pressure levels, apart from reducing inflammation.
- Whole Grains – Stay away from refined grains and choose whole grains that are high in fiber and nutrients. This will significantly help you lower your cholesterol levels and regulate blood pressure.
- Healthy Fats – Choose unsaturated fats, available in olive oil, nuts, and fatty fish. This will help improve your cholesterol levels and reduce plaque buildup. This will significantly reduce risk of atherosclerosis. in arteries.
What are the different risk factors of heart attack that are linked to diet?
The following risk factors are directly linked to risk of heart attack. Awareness of this will help in planning the right dietary approaches to heart attack prevention.
- Atherosclerosis – A diet that is considered as high in saturated, trans fats can cause buildup of cholesterol plaques. This results in narrowing of arteries and reducing flow of blood to the heart.
- Hypertension – A diet that is rich or high in sodium will elevate blood pressure levels. This damages the blood vessels, apart from bringing about an increase in the heart’s burden or workload.
- Inflammation – A poor diet can result in inflammation, that contributes to development of atherosclerosis and heart attacks
- Obesity – When diets cause excessive calorie intake, this causes obesity, which is a major risk factor for heart attack. This is especially when the diets comprise unhealthy food.
Are there diets that are known to be heart-healthy?
Yes, there are certain diets that are known to be heart healthy and can help you cut down on the risk of heart attack. This could be a part of your dietary approaches to heart attack prevention. Here are some of the diets that are considered as heart healthy.
- Mediterranean diet – This diet is known to be high in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, and olive oil. The diet has a limited portion of fish and poultry products. This is known to help people reduce risk of heart attack, as people from the Mediterranean area consume this as regular diet.
- Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (also known as DASH Diet) – This diet is intended to reduce sodium and increase fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and lean proteins intake. This has been acknowledged as effective in lowering blood pressure levels and improving heart health.
Prevent risk of heart attack through early detection and pre-emptive screening
Diet is an important factor that contributes to risk of heart attack. However, there are multiple other reasons that cause a heart attack. This includes the genetic component, wherein, you may be predisposed to risk of heart attack. This could be because you may have inherited genes or you may have certain genetic mutations or variants that predispose you to heart ailments.
The best method to deal with this is to go in for screening to check for any lifetime or future risk of heart ailments. Post-screening, depending on the results you can seek treatment that would include medications, lifestyle modifications and dietary approaches to heart attack prevention. This all round treatment option would considerably reduce your risk of heart attacks in the future or during your lifetime.
Genetic testing is presently available in Tamilnadu to help screen for risk of heart attacks due to genetic predisposition. If there is anyone in your family, like a parent or sibling who has had a heart attack, then it is advisable to seek genetic testing to rule out or confirm the possibility of any risk.
