Optimising Heart Health

It is hard to believe that the idea of heart disease being reversible through modifiable lifestyle choices was a radical one just 30 years ago. Today, many medical bodies emphasise the value of lifestyle interventions, and yet the encouragement of this from doctors’ offices is likely not as thorough as it could be.

When we consider the risk factors we start to understand the importance of diet and lifestyle in the management of cardiovascular health. Healthy lifestyle management signals is a powerful and necessary therapy for individuals at all points along the continuum between vibrant health, dysfunction, pre-disease and diagnosed disease. Ensuring safe and sustainable weight loss and weight management may be an important factor in keeping a healthy heart.

How our Heart Health Specialists can support you

Dietary patterns have changed dramatically in Western countries over the last 100 years. With few exceptions, studies have shown that these changes have been harmful for the populations that consume them, leading to a higher risk of nearly all chronic disease.

Our team of heart specialist nutritional therapists and dietitians will work with you to adapt your diet in a personalised way. Some of the areas they may work with include

1. Saturated Fats – A review of the data has shown that diets consisting of saturated fat, trans-fatty acids, high glycemic load and low folate levels are linked to increased heart disease; while diets consisting of polyunsaturated fats, omega-3 fatty acids, low glycemic load and high in fruits and vegetables consistently lower cardiovascular risk in populations that consume them.
2. Fasting Intermittent fasting has also been shown to improve cardiovascular health by decreasing oxidative stress and inflammation, improving mitochondrial function, cholesterol, triglycerides, insulin sensitivity and blood pressure.
3. Micronutrients Nutrients that are essential for optimal heart health include omega fatty acids, magnesium, CoQ10, Alpha-lipoic acid, Vitamin B3, Vitamins, D, E and K and more.

We offer support from a functional perspective, and understand that statins are not the only answer to managing your heart health. 

The risk of developing heart disease has traditionally been assessed by measurement of LDL-C (low-density lipoprotein cholesterol; the carrier of “bad” cholesterol) and HDL-C (high-density lipoprotein cholesterol; the carrier of “good” cholesterol). 

Recent studies demonstrate that about 50% of heart attacks and strokes occur in people with ‘normal’ cholesterol levels. This suggests that many people at risk are presumed low-risk because they have “normal” or controlled cholesterol levels. Therefore, routine cholesterol tests may fail to fully identify people at risk of heart attack and stroke. 

Although it is essential to assess your cholesterol levels, adverse cardiac events (such as heart attack, stroke or death) have been associated with inflammation, specifically vulnerable plaque related to increased white blood cell activation.

More comprehensive cardiovascular profiles including markers of inflammation such as homocysteine, myeloperoxidase, oxidised LDL and F2-Isoprostanes better help evaluate cardiovascular risk. These indicators help us understand more specifically the development of metabolic or cardiovascular disease, and the formation of vulnerable plaque which may contribute to an increased risk of an adverse event.

Below we have included an example of some of the markers we can test for, produced in an easy to understand report.