Vegetarian diet and afib

I have been reading and thinking of following the approach advocated in highly respected cardiologist Caldwell B. Esselstyn's book " Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease: The Revolutionary, Scientifically Proven, Nutrition-Based Cure" (2007), and wondered if any of you have read the book and are following the diet.

It is strictly vegetarian - no meat, fish, poultry; no fat or oil (including fish oil and avocados [lots of oil]); no dairy - and the diet claims to clean out clogged arteries and prevent other diseases as well. He says that all the stents and other cardiac surgeries and procedures that are performed are unnecessary. He says that doctors do not advocate and insist on nutritional solutions to their patients because mechanical procedures are such BIG money makers for doctors and hospitals, and insurance companies accept them.

Will this approach unbalance the K to Na, and Mg and Calcium ratios that are so critical to afibbers? Will the heavy reliance on beans, beans and and more beans plus all the fiber cause gastro problems that will trigger Afib? Would we get enough calcium and salt?

I am eager to hear from you.
Carol

It is a high carbohydrate diet, which has been shown to be disastrous for us.

William

Carol - Dr. Esselstyn has had remarkable success in taking people with severe arterial blockage who were so ill they didn't qualify for surgery and turned them into healthy, functioning individuals. His work at the Cleveland Clinic has long been known.

Many people do extremely well on a vegetarian diet. It's also known that vegetarians are at high rish for B-vitamin deficiencies and particular attention needs to be that area of testing to be sure they have the B6, B12 and proper folates, etc for methylation which is critical to overall health.

For those of us who don't tolerate a carb load that high, this or similar diets don't do us any favors. I do much better on a Paleo type that limits carb intake with emphasis on protein and healthy fat. Conference Room Session 54 explored the success of Paleo eating and the abatement of afib.

It should be simple enough to test. If you (or anyone) thrives (meaning healthy profile) on that eating plan and eliminates all traces of afib, then, that diet is a good choice. If not, then consider that a high carb diet is not ideal in that case.

Jackie

[www.afibbers.org]
Found this old thread discussing this same topic.

PeggyM

Jackie,

You said: "For those of us who don't tolerate a carb load that high, this or similar diets don't do us any favors. I do much better on a Paleo type that limits carb intake with emphasis on protein and healthy fat. Conference Room Session 54 explored the success of Paleo eating and the abatement of afib. "


Esselstyn says that all of us who eat a typical Western diet have had blocked arteries since youth and they are getting worse as we age. We are heading for heart failure.

Therefore, I ask you what you mean by "tolerating a carb load that high" and how you can justify not adopting a high carb diet?

Carol - because of the problem with glucose handling and insulin production that makes a high-carb diet just not a healthy choice. Are you familar with all the discussions and the report by Ron Rosedale, MD, "Insulin and Its Metabolic Effects? " It's been quoted here on numerous occasions.

Jackie

I follow a mostly vegan diet (occasionally my sugar jones gets the best of me). My afib began back when I was eating a more regular meat/vegies diet, but wasn't caused by that - was caused by dehydration. Now it's set off by anxiety or dehydration. Diet hasn't seemed to stop anything, nor has it seemed to cause anything. Mostly seems unrelated to afib episodes. Unlike dehydration - which I can just feel coming when I don't drink enough water. And poof - it does.

Peggy's live link <[www.afibbers.org];

Carol,

Based on Dean Ornish MD's work on reversing heart disease which included a vegetarian diet with 10% fat 20% protein and 70% carbs, moderate exercise (30 min/day walking), yoga & meditation, I followed his diet program for nearly 20 years. However, I exercised much more than moderate. I competed 10 times in a high altitude endurance race that ended at 14,100' elevation, gained 7850' in elevation and was 13.3 miles long.

And I got afib over 7 years ago.

Now I would not fault the diet one way or the other for afib. Most likely it was the exercise. Even with all that exercise, my BMI was 28, though nobody thought I was overweight. I was about 19% body fat. All of my blood lipid tests were stellar.

I started playing with a glucometer shortly after I got afib. I realized my blood sugar control was not perfect. As my mother's Alzheimer's progressed, I did a lot of study in that area. There are data suggesting a large component of Alz. is insulin insensitivity (resistance) in the brain. That is there is plenty of glucose & plenty of insulin, but the cells do not get enough energy because of the resistance. Her illness and my own glucometer data prompted me to change course two years ago. My diet is now about 70% fat (mostly saturated), 20% protein and 10% carbs. I turned on my ketone processing system.

Without increasing exercise, I dropped about 40 pounds & my body fat is sub 12% now.

As I control my afib very well with the magic trio, I can't say there is an afib difference.

As to heart disease, my resting blood pressure is now in the low 90's/50, with absolutely no signs of hypotension (I can be prone for a long time and immediately spring to vertical without lightheadedness).

For a different perspective, you may wish to read the first 10 chapters of Dr. Carlson's book, Genocide [www.drjamescarlson.com] (click on the MyBook tab near the center).

My suggestion would be to get a glucometer and test fasting and 45 minutes after meals on both types of plans and see which gives the best results. My own goal is to never have either reading above 85 mg/dl (4.2 mmol/l).

George

George,

I think you may have answered this before, but: in a country where virtually all the meat is grain-fed, and therefore loaded with "bad" saturated fats, (as opposed to grass-fed), how do you ensure that such a high saturated fat intake is not lethal? (Not arguing at all against the general low-carb hypothesis).

Ian,

My beef intake is almost all grass fed. However, I'm not sure grain-fed saturated fat is bad, if not taken in with carbs that spike insulin.

When you start looking critically at a lot of the animal studies (rodent, primarily), the high fat, high heart disease cases usually have a high carb component in the diet, too. In addition, many times the saturated fat in the rodent feed is hydrogenated.

George

Ian,

Another thought. One can eat lean meat protein and then add the fat in from a separate source. In the current CR 73 [www.afibbers.org] [www.afibbers.org], I describe coaching my ovo-lacto vegetarian friend through a low carb approach that did have heart electrical benefits. She basically balanced carb and protein intake, which for her was around 60 grams/day of each. The remainder of her diet was fat.

By the way I have more thoughts on the CR & intend to update it, have just been very busy.

George

George,

Pleae take a look at this interview with Esseltyn:

[www.madcowboy.com]

I don't know how anyone can advocate eating meat, dairy, fish, poultry, oils, fat when it is now established that these foods clog arteries, contribute to/cause dementia, high blood pressure, heart attacks, obesity, etc.

Contrary to what Jackie said, Esseltyn has gone beyond saving critically ill cardiac patients at the Cleveland Clinic through plant - based nutrition to an almost messianic spreading the word about nutrition to the general public in an effort to prevent not only cardiac and vascular problems, but a number of other critical health problems.

These diseases are preventable and can be reversed. The economic burden of health care in this country could be radically reduced, if the plan was implemented.

Carol

Has this link been posted?

[sanjayguptamd.blogs.cnn.com]

Ir has Dr Esselstyn's voicing histhoughts.

I think it is his son who has the Engine # 2 diet book.

[engine2diet.com]

Hi Carol,

I'm well aware of the data that Dr. Esselstyn presents. I'm much more familiar with Dr. Ornish's work, but they are espousing the same approach. As I said, I ate this way for many years.

The issue comes back to insulin. If you eat at the truly low fat levels they suggest, 10% to reverse heart disease, 20% for prevention, it works as there is little fat to store when you spike insulin with your 70% caloric intake of carbs. Few people actually do this. One of the problems it you are still subject to the blood sugar swings that the high carb intake brings on. I know, I experienced them. From my look at the data, the lower the fasting insulin, the better. Can't live without it, but in any excess, it is toxic.

Looking at the China data, yes there are parts of the world where their diet is mostly carbs with little meat. However, their caloric intake in general is relatively low compared to here. The problem is living in a society where food is abundant.

My analysis is you can have your take - carbs, but little fat or fat but little carbs. If you want both, you have to restrict caloric intake, so you are eating both very modestly.

My blood lipids were always fine eating the low fat veg way, but I still retained too much weight. It was testing what happened to my blood sugar after a meal, eating this way that convinced me that it was suboptimal.

Eating a lot of saturated fat & other fats in combination with high carbs is a problem and will cause heart disease. This is the state where most of the negative heart data comes from. I recall a rodent study on this topic. They considered 20%, high fat and it was all trans fat. The rest of the food was 20% protein and 60% carbs. They called it a "high fat" diet and the rodents got heart disease.

I'm a data driven person and the most important data is mine personally. I can say the data on fat utilization, energy, blood sugar and satiety is much better on a low carb rather than a low fat approach. Additionally, my blood pressure went from about 108/65 to 90/50, another positive indication. My doctor friends say they almost never see mid 50's age male with those BP numbers.

Eating a lot of red meat for a male or a post menopausal female can cause a build up of iron. I monitor this and I give blood frequently to account for it.

I don't really want to get into it. My only suggestion is to look at all the data, read the studies in detail and see what they really did - don't just read the abstracts, then make up your mind.

Cheers,

George

Thank you, George,

I am busy "digesting" what you wrote.
Carol

All this beating the drums for meat has made me respond. Over the years I've become increasingly conscious that from a human ethics/animal rights view, butchering and eating a highly evolved fellow animal is the same as murder and cannibalism. Reading Dead Meat* by Sue Coe makes one clearly aware of the true horrors. Amazing fact: lobbying achieved over-all exemption of the slaughtering industry from animal rights laws.

Erling

*Dead Meat by Sue Coe, 1996, [www.amazon.com]: "British artist Sue Coe is well known for her social and political paintings and illustrations, which appear regularly in such publications as the New York Times and the New Yorker. Her latest effort is the disturbing book Dead Meat, a visual record of Coe's visits to 40 slaughterhouses, cattle ranches, and hatcheries to document the grisly practices of the meat-packing industry. Although she was not allowed to photograph on the premises, she was permitted to draw and sketch, and much of this work is jarringly graphic. Incorporated with the artwork are her thoughts and observations laid out in diary form. Even if you don't agree with Coe's politics, this is social and political art at its most powerful, in the tradition of Goya, Daumier, and Rockwell Kent."

A reviewer writes: "I received this book as a gift yesterday and stayed up all night reading it and finished it. Luckily, I did not have any nightmares about animals being treated in the way in which Sue Coe describes and paints in this revealing book. I recommend this book to the world; everyone should be aware of the way we treat animals, from pumping them with chemicals and slaughtering them with a knife as they hang from a back foot, to eating them on our dinner tables. The people of the world need to have this information so that they can consciously make a decision about how they can change their contibution regarding these crimes which occur on a daily, hourly, minute by minute basis in every part of the world."

The introduction by Alexander Cockburn, A Short Meat-Oriented History of the World from Eden to the Mattole, may be read at [www.counterpunch.org]

Erling,
I was going to send you this via email, but your name isn't linked... so
at the risk of being off-topic, I'll respond in a personal fashion to your note above.
Although I am not a vegan, I share a concern for animals and will not eat red meat. Animal testing troubles me too - the "rodents" we speak of in medical tests are, for the most part, intelligent animals clearly capable of most emotions shared by humans. I should know, for years I have taken in scores of pet rats who lost their homes for various reasons. Like us, some aren't very bright, some are very bright - but all can be amazing to interact with - they do know what is going on... I have also raised squirrels, and they too, have an amazing depth of awareness and understanding that becomes apparent once trust is established.

Much of what we have discovered about living systems is dependent upon animal testing, and I'm sure that many, many human and even animal lives have been saved or made better as a result of that process. But I sense that something of greater importance seems to be missing, somehow obscured by that goal - I can't quite define it, but I know it is counter to what we are doing. Perhaps that feeling is due to our numbers, as we have doubled population since I was born in the 1940's, and the resulting demands of that are proving to strain the worlds resources well beyond what can be sustained.

I find my aging very difficult to deal with at times, simply from the knowledge of what I have personally taken, in such great numbers, from so many other forms of life just to get to this point in time.

George,

Thanks for answering my Q above. So you are getting grass-fed ok, thought you must be. I do (in Aust), but then even the run-of-the-mill stuff here is less grain-fed. It was just that one hears such horror stories about the US universality of grain-fed, marbled meats, and this being a major suspect in all the US epidemics of "western" diseases (not that Aust is far behind - usually 3rd or 4th etc). Obviously totally agree on the hydrogenated.

The interesting point is your take on the grain-fed with low carbs - that's new to me and may well be relevant - makes some sense. Certainly, some grain in prey species diets must have been quite normal, mainly seasonally, and I'm sure the prey always ate all they could get! (Think horses and oats).

Also agree re adding fats to lean meats. When the grass-fed doesn't seem to have "enough" fat, I add a mainly grass-fed butter (I know they use "a handful" of grain per day per animal - hmmm). But I'm not at the sorts of fat intakes you are. And walnuts are another fat source. But did you recommend specific fats to you your ovo-lacto friend, in terms of sat/mono/poly and your theories as above, or did she just add whatever fat she fancied?

Ian,

She uses what she fancies, but a lot of ghee, coconut oil. I've suggested staying away from omega 6's.

Talked to her tonight. Said she has so much energy now, she & her husband have gone much farther on hikes than before. She thinks this is due to lack of PAC's during exercise due to keeping fasting blood sugar low.

I should point out she's always been active, but even so the 60 gram carb, 60 gram protein diet gives her much more energy due to lack of PAC's.

George

George:

You said your friend is a vegetarian, where does she get her protein from, her Vitamin B12?

One has to know what they are doing with a veggie diet in order to get the proper nutrients, I have seen it first hand when just a veggie diet has caused a lot of health problems.

Liz

Liz,

Ovo-lacto veg. She eats eggs & dairy. Otherwise lots of nuts & other veg. protein.

I ate veg for many years, I can't say there were "a lot of health problems," however I didn't feel it was optimal. Done right, it is a lot better than the SAD diet.

One of the reason Esselstyn & Ornish may have had the success they have it that they took people off the SAD diet and put them on real food. A big improvement.

The place I think it falls down, as I've pointed out, is keeping insulin low & steady.

My concern is Alzheimer's rather than heart disease. A big heart attack beats death by inches in my book any day. Not that I think my current plan is putting me at high risk for that or stroke. Far from it.

There are a lot of data that indicate a very significant part of Alzheimer's is insulin insensitivity in the brain. Avoiding that is high on my list. Of course, if you avoid it in the brain, you do in the rest of your body, too.

I'm also not discounting the genetic risk for AD, but you can't do anything about that.

Cheers,

George

Hi Carol,

Your suggestion (in your first post) to read the entire Dr. Esselstyne interview was perfect. Since that post, and the link, was summarily transferred to 'the other side', here again is the entire interview as a PDF article. As you said, "Please read this in its entirety":

[www.madcowboy.com]

George- Could you direct me to more information about the connection between insulin insensitivity (resistance) in the brain and Alzheimer's ?

Many thanks

Josiah

Josiah,

The thought is that a part of AD is an energy crisis in the brain (unlike your muscles, the brain does not run on fatty acids, only glucose or ketones). There is plenty of insulin and glucose, but because of the insensitivity, the brain cells are not getting enough energy. Hence if you give the brain an alternate source (i.e. ketones) you can alleviate this problem. Of course, by the time you do the intervention, there is irreversible damage, so the effect is not 100%.

Interventions increasing ketone levels in the blood have shown success in some AD cases. Ketones are metabolized in the brain through a different pathway than glucose. So even though the glucose metabolism pathway is damaged, the ketone one still works.

A case study of an intervention:
[www.coconutketones.com]
Other links for info by Dr. Newport
[www.coconutketones.com]
[coconutketones.blogspot.com]
[coconutketones.blogspot.com]


Ketone references:
[www.coconutketones.com]

As an aside, here is a case report on ketones and ALS: [coconutketones.blogspot.com]

A patented medical food Axona that is basically medium chain triglycerides:
<[www.google.es];

A 9 part video that goes into brain metabolism in detail (about 90 minutes total [www.youtube.com] Glucose and ketone metabolism are described, as well as faults in the glucose metabolism.

As an aside, of interest to afibbers, the video mentions a rodent study where ketones were given to animals with cardiomyopathy and the ejection fraction increased 50% (as I recall) in 1/2 hour. I've not been able to find this study.

Sorry if I gave you more than you wanted.

George

This is just another example of the individual differences in afibbers. I've been a vegetarian for 43 years and it suits me well. I was an ovo-lacto vegetarian until I became lactose intolerant several years ago; now my diet consists of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans, and an occasional egg.

I've tried making changes in my diet based on some of the information I've read here but it did more harm than good. When I decreased the amount of carbs in my diet I didn't feel well overall and began having noticeable ectopic beats (which was something new) so I returned to my usual diet. I have started monitoring the amount of potassium I get in my diet and that has been a big help. Increasing my calcium intake has helped as well - probably because I had a low intake previously. I know many people discourage calcium supplements but after trial and error I've learned the optimal intake for my needs.

I do agree that too many carbs coming from the wrong sources is not a good thing, but I seem to need a certain amount of carbs over the course of the day or I just can't function physically or mentally. I guess the best advice as always is to know your body well and stick to what works, even if it may not work well for someone else.

When you say "carbs" what kind of carbs do you have in mind?
Simple or complex?

Carol

Lilly,

When you say "carbs" what kind of carbs do you have in mind?
Simple or complex?

Carol

Here is how to clean out clogged arteries and prevent other diseases as well:

"Over 30 years ago, two ophthalmologists observed that a combination tablet called “Iodo-niacin” (iodide 120 milligrams, niacin 15 milligrams) taken for several months could actually reverse atherosclerotic clogging of arteries. They proved this effect by taking pictures of clogged arteries in the backs of the eyes (“retinal photomicrographs”) before and after treatment. The published photographs showed a significant lessening of the cholesterol-laden artery clogging in the “after” pictures."

"Amazingly enough, no follow-up study has ever been published (probably because niacin and Iodide aren’t patentable). Despite this, the published pictures speak clearly for themselves."

[tahomaclinicblog.com]

From:[curezone.com]

William

Goes into lots of other stuff besides clogged arteries.


[tahomaclinicblog.com]

[curezone.com]