“Open the Door to a Healthy Heart” Campaign in Step
with Nutrition’s Role in Cholesterol Guidelines”
Emphasis on Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes to Decrease Risk of Heart Disease
According to the most recent (2004) update to the National Cholesterol Education Program’s (NCEP) clinical practice guidelines, as issued by the U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services’ National Institutes of Health, therapeutic lifestyle changes (TLC) continue to play a significant role in lowering the risk of heart disease through lowering cholesterol.
Therapeutic lifestyle changes include nutrition, physical activity and weight control, and represent the first line of defense for Americans in preventing heart disease now to avoid being a heart patient later. “Open the Door to a Healthy Heart” is a national consumer awareness campaign focused on nutritional changes for the heart, explaining that heart-healthy eating starts with something as simple as a look inside your refrigerator door.
TLCs “continue to be an essential part of controlling cholesterol. TLC has the potential to reduce cardiovascular risk through several mechanisms beyond LDL (low-density lipoprotein) lowering,” noted Scott Grundy, M.D., director of the Center for Human Nutrition at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas and chair of the NCEP working group that developed the update report. Cardiovascular disease is the number one killer of men and women in the United States, more than all cancers combined.
Even with these statistics and the new findings announced this week from the National Institutes of Health, there appears to be a significant gap between knowing the recommendations and practicing them. “Despite health professionals’ efforts, success in fighting heart disease is slowing down because of unhealthy lifestyles, primarily poor diet, obesity and physical inactivity,” said Dr. Debra Judelson, the Open the Door to a Healthy Heart “Fridge Makeover Doc,” a practicing cardiologist in Beverly Hills, California and former Chair of the Women Physicians Congress of the American Medical Association. “Feeding your family a heart-healthy diet is one of the primary keys to prevention.”
A heart-healthy diet through simple dietary changes has been shown to lower LDL and thus the risk of heart disease. A study of 46 families, published in the December 2000 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association entitled “Individual Cholesterol Variation in Response to a Margarine- or Butter-Based Diet,” found that the families reduced their LDL by an average of 11 percent by switching from butter to soft margarine.
HealthyFridge.org, the web site of the “Open the Door to a Healthy Heart” campaign, notes that substitutions of common items in the refrigerator can significantly reduce saturated fat in the diet and lower blood cholesterol. “Changes in the diet don’t have to be confusing. It’s really all about simple substitutions such as lean chicken instead of full fat beef, soft margarine spreads instead of butter, and low-fat milk in place of whole milk,” said Beth Hubrich, a dietitian spokesperson for the campaign.
High blood cholesterol, along with cigarette smoking, diabetes and hypertension (high blood pressure), represent the four risk factors of coronary heart disease. In a study entitled “Prevalence of Conventional Risk Factors in Patients With Coronary Heart Disease,” published in the August 2003 Journal of the American Medical Association, the study found that that 80 to 90 percent of patients with coronary heart disease have one or more of the four risk factors. These risk factors are now considered more important than genetics when it comes to predicting heart disease.
The cholesterol guidelines, appearing in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association have the endorsement of the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI), the American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association. For an abstract on these new guidelines, visit The American Heart Association’s Circulation at http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/110/2/227 , the National Institute of Health news release at http://www.nih.gov/news/pr/jul2004/nhlbi-12.htm.
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