Foods for Fighting Heart Disease
You already know you need to cut back on your intake of dietary cholesterol and saturated fats to combat heart disease. But what you do eat can help along with what you don’t. Remember, though, as you introduce more of these foods to your diet, substitute-don’t add calories or extra fat, even heart-healthier fats. And keep in mind that individual foods can help your health only as well as the overall nutrition plan they’re part of. With those caveats, here are
some foods that research has shown can help lower your risk of heart disease:
* Fish high in omega-3 fatty acids, including salmon, tuna, mackerel, lake trout and sardines.
* Nuts, especially walnuts and almonds (eaten in place of foods containing saturated fats).
* Oatmeal and oat bran, plus cold cereal made from oatmeal or oat bran, which have been shown to lower cholesterol.
* You can also lower cholesterol with foods, ranging from orange juice to margarine, fortified with plant sterols, which block the absorption of cholesterol in the intestines. The American Heart Association recommends plant-sterolenhanced foods only for people who already have high LDL cholesterol levels, not for routine prevention.
