Originally published December 27 2005
Heart health study urges eaters to replace some carbs with protein
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The Journal of the American Medical Association has published research led by Dr. Lawrence Appel, professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins University, which claims that replacing part of your carbohydrate intake with proteins and healthy fats can improve your heart's health.
"[These changes] can lower blood pressure, improve cholesterol levels and reduce heart disease risk," said Dr. Lawrence Appel, lead author of the study and professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins University.
To test the heart benefits of different diets, the researchers recruited 164 adults with either high blood pressure or the early signs of this problem.
The participants were divided into three groups, based on diets that emphasized carbohydrates, protein or unsaturated fats.
In the protein-rich diet, about half of the proteins eaten were derived from plant sources, like beans, nuts and vegetable-based meat substitutes, which tend to be lower in fat than animal sources of protein.
For example, a higher-carb lunch would consist of a chicken sandwich with mayonnaise on whole wheat bread, while the unsaturated-fat-rich dieters would eat their chicken sandwich with olive-oil margarine and barbeque sauce on white bread.
Snacks for the groups varied, too, with trail mix featured in the carb diet, cottage cheese for the protein eaters and olive oil potato chips for the unsaturated fat group.
After staying on the diets for six weeks and maintaining a constant body weight, researchers found that all of the diets helped to lower the participants' blood pressure and bad, or LDL, cholesterol levels.
Previous studies have shown that consuming high amounts of salt and alcohol as well as being overweight can all affect blood pressure and heart disease risk, but this is the first study to show that macronutrients, like proteins and fats, may affect blood pressure in a positive way, say the authors from the OmniHeart Collaborative Research Group, which conducted the study.
The authors caution, however, that all of the participants were put on meal plans that are healthier than the typical American diet, possibly explaining why all three diets helped to improve the participants' heart health.
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