Follow The Heart Disease Diet For Longer Life

Food, Exercise, Heart Disease & Your Health

The Plan

Start the diet regimen by creating daily menus specifically. It is better to eat small frequent meals of about 4 to 6 a day, instead of going all out on a couple of huge meals. Select the foods that will contribute to a healthy heart and list these down accordingly. Write down every type of food you intend to eat, the amount or ratio, as well as the time you need to eat. Make sure you drink lots of water too for hydration and proper absorption. 8 to 12 glasses daily is excellent.

Also begin eating in moderation. Try to leave a little on your plate during each meal or snack. Chew your food properly and do not overload your plate. It takes about 20 minutes before your brain begins to feel full, so take your time when dining. As for servings, you should measure these according to weight or grams. At first, you will need a weighing scale when preparing food. Later on, you can just look and estimate.

The Good Fats

You should learn how to limit unhealthy cholesterol and fats. Lowering these will greatly help in reducing the risk of developing coronary artery disease. High blood cholesterol causes buildup of plaques in the arteries or atherosclerosis, thereby boosting heart attack risk and stroke. The AHA or American Heart Association provides guidelines on how to include fat and cholesterol in a heart disease diet.

Saturated fat should constitute no more than 7% of your total daily calories. Trans fat should constitute no more than 1% of your total daily calories. Cholesterol should be lower than 300 milligrams per day for adults or less than 200 milligrams per day for adults with high LDL or low-density lipoprotein, also known as bad cholesterol.

The Use of Fats

When using fats, choose monounsaturated fats like canola or olive oil. Polyunsaturated fats are found in seeds and nuts. These are ideal options for a heart disease diet. All kinds of fat are high in calories. Some of the good fats to use include trans fat-free margarine, olive oil, canola oil and cholesterol-reducing margarine. Stay away from butter, lard, gravy, bacon, cream sauce, nondairy creamers, hydrogenated margarine and shortening, coconut oil and palm-kernel oil.

Consuming Protein

It is ideal to eat enough protein to build and maintain muscle. However, you should pick from the right sources such as skim or low fat milk, legumes, skinless poultry, lean ground meat, soybeans, fish and egg whites. Try to limit or eliminate unhealthy proteins in your heart disease diet such as cold cuts, bacon, egg yolks, organ meats, frankfurters and sausages.

Also eat more fruits and vegetables since these can aid in digestion. Good sources include low-sodium canned veggies, fresh or frozen fruits and vegetables and canned fruit packed in water. Sources that need to be controlled include fried or breaded vegetables, vegetables having creamy or thick sauce, coconut and canned fruit in heavy syrup.

Exercise

Exercise is also a very important part of anybody's health.  Read our section on doing some light to moderate exercise for weight loss and general health.

So by following a heart disease diet plan and by putting in some moderate exercise, heart disease should be kept at bay!

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