Heart Disease

Evidence-graded topics and articles tagged Heart Disease.

Topics

Anthocyanins — Anthocyanins are plant pigments found mainly in berries.
Calcium — Calcium from food or supplements gives bones a small density boost, but large recent trials show little clear effect on fractures when calcium is taken alone.
Coenzyme Q10 — Coenzyme Q10 shows moderate evidence for reducing mortality and hospitalisations when added to standard medical care in chronic heart failure.
Coffee — Large observational studies link 3 to 4 cups of coffee a day with a lower risk of death, heart disease and type 2 diabetes, but they cannot prove cause.
Dark Chocolate — Flavanol-rich dark chocolate and cocoa lower blood pressure by about 2 mmHg in short trials.
Fish Oil — Fish oil rich in EPA eases symptoms of depression in adults, a modest benefit supported by low-certainty evidence.
Folate (folic acid) — Taken before and during early pregnancy, folic acid prevents neural tube birth defects such as spina bifida, cutting the risk by roughly 70% in pooled randomis…
Green Tea — Small drops in weight and blood pressure in trials, with a small extra weight loss when combined with exercise.
Mediterranean Diet — Eating a Mediterranean-style diet - built on olive oil, nuts, fish, vegetables, legumes and whole grains - reduced heart attacks and strokes in large randomise…
Multivitamins — A daily multivitamin may slightly improve memory in older adults and slowed two DNA-based aging clocks in one trial, but the evidence for both is limited and m…
Nuts — Nuts lower LDL cholesterol a little in trials and, in trials lasting more than three weeks, do not appear to cause weight gain.
Olive Oil — Extra virgin olive oil, eaten as part of a Mediterranean diet, is linked to fewer heart events, and a large trial of that diet found fewer major heart events.
Pet Ownership — Dog owners have lower death rates in large observational studies, and time with pets eases stress and anxiety in the short term.
Pomegranate Juice — Drinking pomegranate juice may lower systolic blood pressure by roughly 5 to 8 mmHg and diastolic by roughly 2 to 3 mmHg, but the evidence is limited and resul…
Poultry — Poultry is the mildest of the meats in large studies: higher intake is linked to slightly lower all-cause mortality, and swapping red meat for poultry is linke…
Red Meat — Lean, unprocessed red meat can fit inside a Mediterranean-style eating pattern: in a feeding trial, more lean beef or pork did not worsen most cardiometabolic…
Red Yeast Rice — Red yeast rice lowers LDL ('bad') cholesterol in trials, by roughly 20 to 40 mg/dL, because it naturally contains monacolin K — the same compound as the prescr…
Salt — Cutting salt lowers blood pressure - by about 4 mm Hg systolic in pooled trials, and more when blood pressure starts higher.
Seed Oils — Seed oils such as canola, soybean, sunflower and corn are high in omega-6 linoleic acid.
Selenium — In trials, selenium improved eye signs and quality of life in people with mild Graves' eye disease, and in selenium-poor parts of China supplements cut the rat…
Ultra-processed food — Controlled feeding trials find people eat several hundred extra calories a day on ultra-processed diets and lose less weight than on minimally processed ones.
Vitamin K2 — Vitamin K2 may help keep spine bone density up in postmenopausal women, but fracture results are mixed and the artery studies are small and do not agree.
Whisky and Spirits — Whisky and other spirits are drinks of almost pure alcohol, and the honest benefits are modest: small trials found whisky, gin and vodka raised 'good' choleste…