A new study tells us the best way to keep our hearts healthy, and it involves six special foods.
The researchers at McMaster University and Hamilton Health Sciences found that not eating enough of these six foods together can increase your risk of heart disease.
The ‘Magnificent Six’
The six foods that keep your heart smiling are fruits, vegetables, legumes (like beans and lentils), nuts, fish, and whole-fat dairy products.
Eating these can lower your chances of getting cardiovascular disease (CVD), which includes heart attacks and strokes.
The good news is that you can also include moderate amounts of whole grains and unprocessed meats in your diet. This gives us lots of ways to eat healthy and keep our hearts strong!
A Global Food Fight
Previous studies focused on Western countries and diets mixing good foods with not-so-good, ultra-processed foods. This study was different. It looked at healthy foods on a global scale.
The World Health Organization says that almost 18 million people died from CVD in 2019. This was 32% of all deaths worldwide. Most of these deaths were because of heart attacks and strokes.
The researchers looked at data from 245,000 people in 80 countries. The findings were published in the European Heart Journal.
How They Did It
The research team used data from the ongoing Prospective Urban and Rural Epidemiological (PURE) study. They then checked these findings with five other studies.
This let them look at health outcomes in different parts of the world and in people with and without previous CVD.
“Diet scores used in past studies like the EAT-Lancet Planetary Diet and the Mediterranean Diet mostly looked at Western countries.
The PURE Healthy Diet Score included a mix of high, middle, and low-income countries,” said Salim Yusuf, the senior author of the study.
The PURE Healthy Diet Score only looked at protective or natural foods.
“We were unique in focusing only on these types of foods. Other diet scores mixed harmful foods—like processed and ultra-processed foods—with healthy foods,” said Andrew Mente, the first author of the study.
The Middle Road is Best
The researchers showed that eating more fruits, vegetables, nuts, and legumes can prevent disease. But they also found that balance is key.
“Eating moderate amounts of fish and whole-fat dairy can lower the risk of CVD and death. The same benefits can come from moderate eating of grains and meats—if they’re whole grains and unprocessed meats,” said Mente.
Here’s Your Healthy Heart Meal Plan
The PURE Healthy Diet Score suggests eating the following each day: two to three servings of fruits; two to three servings of vegetables; one serving of nuts; and two servings of dairy.
It also includes three to four weekly servings of legumes and two to three weekly servings of fish. If you want, you can swap in one daily serving of whole grains, and one daily serving of unprocessed red meat or poultry.
In short, a mix of these ‘magnificent six’ foods, along with a few other heart-friendly choices, can keep your heart healthy and happy. So, what are you waiting for? Start your heart-healthy diet today!
If you care about heart health, please read studies about how eating eggs can help reduce heart disease risk, and Vitamin K2 could help reduce heart disease risk.
For more information about heart health, please see recent studies about how to remove plaques that cause heart attacks, and results showing a new way to prevent heart attacks, and strokes.
The study was published in European Heart Journal. Follow us on Twitter for more articles about this topic.
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