The 7 Biggest Challenges to Healthy Heart and, What you Can or Can't do about them

Our heart is a very important organ and a very complicated one. Our hearts move blood around the body, delivering oxygen, nutrients and bioactive substances while removing carbon dioxide and metabolic waste from our bloodstream. Keeping our hearts healthy should be on the minds of everyone who wants to live a clean healthy lifestyle, especially so that you can experience all the beauty South Africa has to offer from its beaches to it mountains.

The Seven Challenges of Heart Health

According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) there are seven primary causes for heart disease(*1). Age, Gender and Family History (Genetics), are three that we can do little about. Smoking, lack of physical activity and stress are three that we can manage and moderate in our lives. The biggest cause is an UNHEALTHY DIET, and this is the cause that we, especially as South Africans have the most control over.

Many heart risk factors like high blood sugar, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, obesity and type-2 diabetes: all diet driven risk factors.

Narrowing down the topic of Heart Health

To narrow down the Topic of Heart Health, we will be focusing on "Diet related, low grade inflammation and heart health," as it is a reality that many people unknowingly live with. Even though it is true that cholesterol control is important, what the mainstream media doesn't tell you is that half of all cardiac deaths are in people without elevated cholesterol(2*).

We've known about the "inflammation connection" for decades:

In the early 1990's the SAB, along with many other forward thinking scientific minds like those from cripps Conferences, Linus Pauling Institute, Experimental Biology events, were already pointing to the “oxidation and inflammation” connection as a cause. With the leading name being Paul Ridker who wasn't acknowledge at first until much later on. Today his ideas are recognized as the turning point in the thinking of heart disease and now inflammation is broadly accepted as a driver of heart disease.

The trend lines for Heart related diseases don't look good:

Many people don't know, or care that our diets contain both good and bad heart related substances. As a result of people either not caring or not wanting to change their diets Heart disease remains the leading cause of death around the world. According to the America College of Cardiology this is only going to get worse from now to 2060(*3)

Projections of cardiovascular disease in the US from 2025-2060. (*3)

How can you remove the “die” from your diet?

Step 1: Take control of your diet. The balance between inflammatory and anti-inflammatory content should be something you think about.

Reduce pro-inflammatory foods. This means that you need to eat less junk foods, sweets and Sugary drinks. Foods that contain carbohydrates, modified fats and oils, high fat and processed meats, full-fat dairy, fried foods, and sugar-sweetened beverages(*5).

Balances out your diet in a positive way, increase your anti-inflammatory foods these are foods like Fruits, vegitables, whole grains, omega-3 rich fatty fish, nuts, legumes, and other high-fiber foods. As some of these foods are ich in antioxidants, polyphenols and fiber. As the old saying goes, "An apple a day, keeps the doctor away."

Moving the needle from a pro-inflammatory diet to an anti-inflammatory diet is fundamental to optimizing heart health and reducing heart disease risk. (*5-7)

Very big clinical investigations and meta-analyses have shown that supplements can help reduce the relationship between inflammatory and anti-inflammatory foods in your diet. It is also a powerful tool that can protect your heart from inflammatory issues(*8-9).

This is no surprise to the NeoLife SAB:

Understanding and investigating the roles of nutrients in the inflammation/anti-inflammation balance has been a significant part of SAB research and product development for over 30 years. Our 2005 intervention trial showed that Salmon Oil Plus (SO+) has powerful heart health benefits because it supported healthy inflammatory processes and maintained healthy triglyceride levels (10*).

Renowned omega-3 researcher Dr. Karsten Gronerts' research with SAB showed us that  SO+ supplementation supports production of inflammatory mediators that support a healthy inflammatory response(*11). Along with SO+ Carotenoid Complex protected heart health by supporting healthy cholesterol levels, according to the US department of Agriculture (*12).

Your Heart is a muscle that will hopefully never stop working as your heart needs to pump blood 24/7. To do this as well as increase production on demand, your heart has about 2-3 billion muscle cells. A good anti-inflammatory diet filled with all the good foods, fruits and vegitables that you need to survive with some good supplementation should help prevent heart disease and dysfunction.

If you struggle with consistently eating a healthy diet and meeting your nutritional recommendations, you can use supplements as a tool to help you fill in the gaps. YourDay2Day provides a great selection of nature-based, science-backed, heart-friendly nutritional supplements to help you stay in control.

If you would like to purchase Omega-3 Salmon Oil Plus from YourDay2Day Click Here!

If you would like to purchase Carotenoid Complex from YourDay2Day  Click Here!

If you would like to have a look at our extensive range of nutritional products at YourDay2Day  Click Here!

References:

1. Know Your Risk for Heart Disease. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Updated December 8, 2019. https://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/risk_factors.htm.

2. Sachdeva A, et al. Lipid levels in patients hospitalized with coronary artery disease: An analysis of 136,905 hospitalizations in Get With The Guidelines. Am Heart J. 2009 Jan; 157(1): 111-7. doi: 10.1016/j.ahj.2008.08.010.

3. Mohebi R, et al. Cardiovascular disease projections in the United States based on the 2020 census estimates. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2022 Aug; 80(6): 565-78. doi: 10.1016/j.jacc.2022.05.033.

4. Anand SS, et al. Food consumption and its impact on cardiovascular disease: Importance of solutions focused on the globalized food system. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2015 Oct; 66(14): 1590–614. doi: 10.1016/j.jacc.2015.07.050.

5. Avoiding Inflammatory Foods Can Lower Heart Disease, Stroke Risk. American College of Cardiology. Published November 2, 2020. https://www.acc.org/about-acc/press-releases/2020/11/02/19/00/avoiding-inflammatory-foods-can-lower-heart-disease-stroke-risk.

6. Shivappa N, et al. Association of pro-inflammatory diet with low-grade inflammation: Results from the Moli-sani study. Nutrition. 2018 Oct; 54: 182–8. doi: 10.1016/j.nut.2018.04.004.

7. Foods that fight inflammation. Harvard Health Publishing. Published November 16, 2021. https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/foods-that-fight-inflammation.

8. Souza PR, et al. Enriched marine oil supplements increase peripheral blood specialized pro-resolving mediators concentrations and reprogram host immune responses: A randomized double-blind placebo-controlled study. Circ Res. 2020 Jan; 126(1): 75–90. doi: 10.1161/CIRCRESAHA.119.315506.

9. Hu Y, Hu FB, Manson JE. Marine omega-3 supplementation and cardiovascular disease: An updated meta-analysis of 13 randomized controlled trials involving 127 477 participants. J Am Heart Assoc. 2019 Oct; 8(19): e013543. doi: 10.1161/JAHA.119.013543.

10. Carughi A. Effect of Omega-3 fatty acid supplementation on cardiovascular risk factors and inflammatory markers. Presented at: Annual Linus Pauling Institute’s Conference on Diet and Optimum Health; 2009 May 13-16; Corvallis, OR.

11. Gronert K, Carughi A, et al. Impact of dietary ω-3 and ω-6 PUFA on DHA-derived protective autacoids circuit. Presented at the 11th International Conference Bioactive Lipids in Cancer, Inflammation and Related Diseases; 2009 Oct 25-28; Cancun.

12. Kramer TR, Burri BJ. Modulated mitogenic proliferative responsiveness of lymphocytes in whole-blood cultures after a low-carotene diet and mixed-carotenoid supplementation in women. Am J Clin Nutr. 1997 Mar;65(3):871-5.

NeoLife products have not been certified through Sahpra. Please consult your health professional about any specifics.