Battling Heart and Stroke

We all know that our diet is a key factor to being and keeping healthy. It is the food we eat that provides us the energy to perform our daily activities - it is what keeps our heart pumping. Now, we get to wonder, what do high performance athletes eat? What gives them the energy, the power to run, swim, jump or lift weights faster and better than non-athletic people like you and me?

Here are some examples of what Olympic athletes eat on a normal day. More →

Fish and omega-3 fatty acids

Fish is a good natural source of omega-3 fatty acids, the heart-friendly fats that according to the American Heart Association (AHA): More →

The adverse effects of heavy drinking: too much of a good thing can be bad

As promised, I present here the second part of the series of resource posts on alcohol consumption and its effect on cardiovascular health. In the first part, I’ve tackled the health benefits associated with light to moderate alcohol drinking. In this post, I present a review of the adverse effects of alcohol drinking.

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In some parts of the world, children are dying of hunger; in other parts, children are dying from obesity-related health problems. Such irony.

Childhood obesity is becoming a major problem in the developed world. In the US alone, 16.9% of boys and 15.6% of girls aged 6 to 11 years among non-Hispanic whites are overweight. Among non-Hispanic blacks, it’s 17.2% of boys and 24.8%of girls in the same age group. For Mexican Americans, it’s 25.6% of boys and 16.6% of girls. (Source: American Heart Association (AHA)). Obesity is a major risk factor in cardiovascular health as well as type 2 diabetes.

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Part I: The Health Benefits of Alcohol - “Eat, drink and be healthy”

Drinking alcohol has been linked to a wide range of health effects, ranging from the very good to the very bad. A post in June reported on the adverse effects of heavy drinking on cardiovascular health. On the other hand, light to moderate drinking has been shown to have long lasting beneficial effects. The only problem is how to determine the boundary between healthy and unhealthy alcohol consumption. Some researchers are concerned that recent reports about the health benefits of alcohol may mislead people to drink more than they should, thereby doing more harm than good to their health.

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Your weekend news…Happy reading!

CVD Lifestyle Watch

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Starting this month, I will be compiling the week’s news related to cardiovascular disorders (CVD) for you to read over weekend.

CVD nutrition watch

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Hey, blueberry lovers. Your favorite fruit may just be the way to lower your cholesterol and save your heart.

The wild blueberry Vaccinium angustifolium is a rich source of concentrated non-nutritive antioxidants. And these antioxidants seem to be able to lower cholesterol levels.

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“A double cheese burger, fries, and soda to go.” How many times do we repeat this phrase in a week? A month? A year?

But what has fast food got to do with Battling Heart and Stroke? A lot, actually. Because here we also tackle nutrition and diet and how they affect your heart and blood vessels.

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By Gerene Schendel

There is something to the adage “An apple a day keeps the doctor away”. How more perfect can a food get? It comes in a convenient serving size, with very little calories and even has its own wrapper. Possibly one of the reasons the teachers of yesteryear stayed so healthy when school children all brought apples to adorn the desk.

Apples have been cited for reducing the risk of heart disease. They also have proved in lab tests to be beneficial in stopping the growth of cancer cells. Most of the apples healing power resides in the apples skin, a compound called quercetin, a powerful antioxidant that can prevent oxygen molecules from damaging individual cells. Over time this antioxidant helps to prevent changes in cells that can lead to cancer.

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