What are the foods your heart prefers? - By Dr harold Gunatillake

What are the foods your heart prefers? – By Dr harold Gunatillake

Harold-Gunethilake

How does healthy food help your heart?
Unhealthy foods cause heart disease, other than the minority born with congenital defects, Eating daily the right food for the heart will keep your heart ticking with a regular healthy beat during your lifespan.

A healthy diet can help reduce your risk of developing coronary heart disease and stop you from gaining weight, reducing your risk of diabetes and high blood pressure.

It can also help lower your cholesterol levels and reduce your risk of some cancers. A healthy diet can benefit your heart even if you already have a heart condition. The first step toward maintaining heart health is understanding heart disease risk factors. Your risk depends on many factors, some of which are changeable and others that are not. Risk factors are conditions or habits that make a person more likely to develop a disease. These risk factors may be different for each person. Life has become so stressful with unhealthy lifestyles that most people find it challenging to lead a healthy life.

Preventing heart disease starts with knowing what your risk factors are and what you can do to lower them. High blood pressure, which most people get as they age, is the most common natural cause of
heart disease, influenced by your dietetic habits. Most people are unaware that they have this silent disease, as the body gets used to higher blood pressures, until warnings such as feeling giddy, and if steps are not taken to rectify the situation, you end up with a stroke or heart disease. When you are sixty and over, you must regularly check your blood pressure with a digital device at home.

Eating foods with high saturated fats frequently can cause unhealthy hearts. Such foods will increase your body weight and triglyceride and cholesterol levels in your blood.

Choosing certain foods, such as fruits and vegetables, while limiting others, such as saturated fats, added salt and sugars, is essential for a healthy heart. There are specific diets to prevent high blood pressure, such as the DASH eating plan, which has been proven to lower high blood pressure and bad cholesterol in the blood, resulting in a healthy heart. Let’s talk more about the DASH Eating Plan. The DASH eating plan requires no special foods and provides daily and weekly nutritional goals. This plan recommends:

Eating vegetables, fruits, and whole grains
Including fat-free or low-fat dairy products,
fish, poultry, beans, nuts, and vegetable oils
Limiting foods that are high in saturated fat,
such as fatty meats, full-fat dairy products,
and tropical oils such as coconut, palm kernel, and palm oils
Limiting sugar-sweetened beverages and sweets.

When following the DASH eating plan, it is essential to choose foods that are:

Low in saturated and trans fatsRich in potassium, calcium, magnesium, fibre, and protein and low in sodium DASH stands for Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) has tied for first out of 39 diets for “Best Diets for Healthy Eating” and “Best Heart-Healthy Diets” in the 2021 Best Diets report from U.S. News & World Report. DASH, which builds nutrient-dense meals around whole grains, low-fat dairy products, vegetables, and fruits, and includes fish… Foods to eat for a heart-healthy eating plan include.

Vegetables such as leafy greens (spinach, collard greens, kale, cabbage), broccoli, and carrots
Fruits such as apples, bananas, oranges, pears, grapes, and prunes
Whole grains such as plain oatmeal,
brown rice, and whole-grain bread or tortillas
Fat-free or low-fat dairy foods such as milk, cheese, or yogurt
Protein-rich foods:
Fish high in omega-3 fatty acids (salmon, tuna, and trout)
Lean meats such as 95% lean ground beef or pork tenderloin or skinless chicken or turkey
Eggs
Nuts, seeds, and soy products (tofu)
Legumes such as kidney beans, lentils, chickpeas, black-eyed peas, and lima beans
Stick to oils and foods high in monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats.
Canola, corn, olive, safflower, sesame, sunflower, and soybean oils (not coconut or palm oil)
Nuts such as walnuts, almonds, and pine nuts
Nut and seed butter
Salmon and trout
Seeds (sesame, sunflower, pumpkin, or flax)
Avocados
Tofu

Food to restrict are:
Adding salt to your food can increase your blood pressure. Adults and children over 14 should eat less than 2,300 milligrams of sodium daily. Children younger than 14 may need to eat even less sodium daily based on sex and age. You may need to limit sodium even more if you have high blood pressure.

The body needs a small amount of sodium to function, but most Americans consume too much. High sodium consumption can raise blood pressure, a significant risk factor for heart disease and stroke. Overeating salt, in addition to affecting heart health, also can cause kidney disease and kidney stones.

There is no evidence that salt directly causes atherosclerosis or the thickening of blood vessels that cause high blood pressure. If you already have high blood pressure, however, a diet high in sodium may increase the risk of developing atherosclerosis.

Many people eat spicy foods like biriyani and lamprai. These foods must be eaten in small quantities and less frequently. To make it a balanced diet, you should include fresh veggies and fruits and other nutritious foods in your diet, too.

Is meat good for your heart?
The research, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, found that a higher intake of processed meat, unprocessed red meat, or poultry was associated with a small increased risk of coronary heart disease, stroke, heart failure, and death related to heart and circulatory disease. Newer studies lead doctors to believe that red meat contains nutrients that, when broken down in your gut, produce trimethylamine-N-oxide (TMAO). TMAO raises your chances of developing hardened arteries, heart attack, and stroke.

Is chicken good for your heart?
Yes! Chicken provides under-consumed vitamins and minerals and can be the centre of the plate for a heart-healthy, low-fat, low-cholesterol diet, such as the DASH. Are eggs good for your heart? Most healthy people can eat up to seven eggs a week without increasing their risk of heart disease. Some studies have shown that this level of egg consumption might even help prevent certain types of stroke and a serious eye condition called macular degeneration that can lead to blindness.

Is mutton good for your heart?
Overeating red meat in the form of lamb, mutton, and pork might increase your odds of suffering from diabetes and heart disease. It is mainly because these food items have a high saturated fat content, which boosts cholesterol.

Is Rice good for heart patients?
A recent study found that diets high in refined grains, which include white rice, white flour, and white bread, are associated with an increased risk for premature coronary artery disease. In contrast, they found that diets high in whole grains were associated with a decreased risk for premature coronary artery disease.

Between eating white rice and unprocessed brown rice, a recent study has revealed that eating a diet high in refined grains may increase the risk of premature coronary artery disease, while diets high in whole grains may decrease this risk.

In contrast, they found that diets high in whole grains were associated with a decreased risk for premature coronary artery disease.

I hope this video presentation was helpful in choosing a healthy diet for heart health. So let me say goodbye until we meet again.

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