Nutrition For Heart Health
Through my work both at the Cleveland Clinic Heart Center’s Preventive Cardiology Department and The American Heart Association in Cleveland, I developed a love for the dietary treatment and prevention of cardiovascular disease. Not only are cholesterol levels, blood pressure and blood sugar affected by our dietary intake, but so are inflammatory responses in our blood vessels and vascular reactivity.
Some ground-breaking research (The Lyon Diet Heart Study) originally published in the medical journal Lancet in 1994, strengthened the idea that diet is a cornerstone for cardiovascular disease treatment and prevention. This is how the benefits of a Mediterranean-style dietary pattern first started to get noticed by consumers and health care providers.
There is no doubt that foods eaten regularly in certain areas of the world allow for better health by those who live there. The challenge still exists in translating what research participants actually ate into foods available in our own neighborhoods. Simply saying “follow a Mediterranean Diet”is not quite enough information to truly treat and prevent disease. Mediterranean Diet could mean lots of things…in fact there are over 16 countries that border the Mediterranean Sea. Each of these countries has cultural, ethnic, religious, economic and agricultural differences.
Despite obvious variances in foods eaten in the Mediterranean region there is an important dietary pattern (similarities in foods eaten) that emerges. The great news is that these can be translated into foods in your very own backyard! There are also significant dietary elements that can be translated in other cuisines all-together such as certain Asian and Island foods.
Julie provides lectures and culinary programs for consumers and health care providers on the elements of the Mediterranean Diet and she sees patients by appointment for dietary therapy for treatment and prevention of cardiovascular disease (including cholesterol management, blood pressure management and blood sugar management).
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Register for Nutrition Solutions By Julie on-line for menu ideas, recipes, nutritional plans and food product information for the “Mediterranean Way”.
