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Why a High-Carb Diet Can Harm Your Heart

Vegetables

A long-term study suggests that eating a low-carb, high-fat diet does not raise the risk of heart disease.

The study, which examined more than 82,000 women over 20 years, found that those who got their carbohydrates from refined sugars and processed foods nearly doubled their risk of heart disease.

However, those who ate a low-carb diet, but got more of their protein and fat from vegetables, cut their heart disease risk by 30 percent compared with those who ate more animal fats.

Conventional wisdom says that the risk of heart disease should increase for those eating the lowest-carb, highest-fat diet.

The women examined in the study were divided into 10 different groups based on their intake of calories from carbohydrates. They were not dieting to lose weight, and on average increased their body mass index by roughly 10 percent during the study.


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Dr. Mercola''s Comments Dr. Mercola's Comments:

Conventional medicine has taken another look at the low-carb diet and was, again, surprised by the positive results; The women who ate low-carb diets decreased their risk of heart disease. Two important things to note: the women in the study weren't following a prescribed diet like the flawed Atkins program and dieting wasn't an issue.

The best results were achieved by women who were on diets that were both low in simple, processed carbohydrates and high in low-sugar vegetables.

No major mystery here.

Eating your vegetables is one of the keys to staying healthy; nearly everyone knows that. A low-carb, high-vegetable diet may sound like a contradiction to some, but it isn't actually that difficult to achieve.

The above study is not the only one that determined that a diet rich in vegetables can lower your risk of heart disease. One such study included almost 110,000 men and women whose health and dietary habits were followed for 14 years.

The higher the average daily intake of  vegetables and fruits, the lower the chances of developing cardiovascular disease. Those who averaged eight or more servings a day were 30 percent less likely to have had a heart attack or stroke.

The only caution here is to make sure you are aware that although all vegetables have useful ingredients, some vegetables may not be ideal for you. The crucial factor in any diet you follow: Tailoring it according to the foods your body burns best based on its unique nutritional type.

What is interesting though is that if you are a carb nutritional type you may actually thrive on a HIGH-carb diet, and a low-carb diet like the one described in this study may actually paradoxically increase heart disease.

Same cautions still apply though; even carb types need to limit or avoid sugar and processed foods. They just seem to tolerate as much as 300 percent more grains than protein types and actually require a few healthy grains in their diet. But, just like protein types, they are best served by a predominance of vegetables as their source of carbs.

nutritional typing tells us vegetables that will alkalinize one person will cause someone else's blood pH to become acidic. Optimization of your blood pH is an important aspect of staying healthy, so it is important to understand which vegetables are best for you.

Listen to what your body tells you. If you just simply can't stand the taste of a particular vegetable then this is probably a clue that it is not good for you and should be avoided.



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