10 Features of a Heart-healthy Eating Pattern

The statement details 10 features of a dietary pattern to promote heart health:

• Balance food and calorie intake with physical activity to maintain a healthy weight

• Choose a wide variety and eat plenty of fruits and vegetables to get a full range of nutrients from food rather than supplements

• Choose whole grains and other foods made up mostly of whole grains

• Include healthy sources of lean and/or high-fiber protein such as plant proteins (nuts and legumes), fish or seafood, low fat or non-fat dairy, lean cuts of meat, and limit red and processed meats

• Use liquid non-tropical plant oils such as olive or sunflower oils

• Choose minimally processed foods rather than ultra-processed foods as much as possible

• Minimize intake of beverages and foods with added sugars

• Choose or prepare foods with little or no salt

• Limit alcohol consumption; if you don’t drink, do not start

• Apply this guidance no matter where food is prepared or consumed

Processed foods include meats that are preserved by smoking, curing, or adding chemical preservatives and plant-based foods that have added salt, sugar, or fats.

Many processed types of meat are high in salt, saturated fat, and cholesterol. Research shows that replacing processed meat with other protein sources is associated with lower death rates.

Ultra-processed foods are those that go beyond added salt, sweeteners, or fat to also include artificial colors, flavors, and preservatives that promote shelf stability, preserve texture and increase palatability.

Other benefits:

A heart-healthy diet and healthy lifestyle behaviors such as regular physical activity and avoiding exposure to tobacco products are key from childhood throughout adulthood to lower the heart disease risk.

Women who eat a heart-healthy diet can reduce heart disease risk factors, which may help to prevent unhealthy weight gain in their children.

Evidence shows that the prevention of childhood obesity is key to preserving and prolonging heart health throughout the life span. Later in life, people who eat a heart-healthy diet have slower age-related declines in thinking abilities and memory.

For the first time, the issue of sustainability is included in the Association’s dietary guidelines. Commonly consumed animal products, particularly red meat (beef, lamb, pork, veal, venison, or goat), have the largest environmental impact in terms of water and land usage and contribute significantly to greenhouse gas emissions.

Hence, shifting reliance from meat to plant proteins can help to improve individual health and the environment.

However not all sustainable diets are heart-healthy. For example, if a plant-based diet includes lots of refined carbohydrates and added sugars, the risk of type 2 diabetes and heart disease increases.

The dietary guidance discusses several challenges that can make it harder to adopt or maintain a heart-healthy diet. These include:

• Widespread dietary misinformation from the Internet

• A lack of nutrition education in grade schools and medical schools

• Food and nutrition insecurity – According to references cited in the statement, an estimated 37 million Americans had limited or unstable access to safe and nutritious foods in 2020

• Structural racism and neighborhood segregation

• Targeted marketing of unhealthy foods and beverages

Creating an environment that promotes and supports adherence to heart-healthy dietary patterns among all individuals is a public health imperative.

On an individual level, the new statement reinforces a 2020 American Heart Association statement for health care professionals that encouraged routine assessment of patients’ dietary quality and inclusion of this information in the medical record so there is follow-up at the next appointment.

Source: Medindia