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A healthy, balanced dietary pattern, rather than one focused on individual nutrients or foods, is key to maintaining heart health, according to a new ACC Scientific Statement on Food and Health: Nutrition for Prevention and Management of Cardiovascular Disease. Read the full Statement in JACC.
Key Takeaways
The Statement reviews current evidence on nutrition and cardiovascular health, including macronutrients, micronutrients, dietary patterns, ultra-processed foods and emerging nutrition-based interventions, and offers consensus recommendations on incorporating food and health into clinician/patient discussions on preventing and managing heart disease.
Implications For CV Kidney Metabolic Health
Overall, the Statement highlights the central role that diet and nutrition play in preventing and managing cardiovascular kidney metabolic syndrome, which includes interconnected conditions such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, obesity and chronic kidney disease.
“Suboptimal diet is a key risk factor for cardiovascular disease, and diet and lifestyle modification is widely considered essential for both primary and secondary prevention,” said Writing Committee Chair Frank B. Hu, MD, PhD. “However, the concept of a ‘heart-healthy’ diet has evolved over time from nutrient-centric approaches to more holistic, food- and pattern-based strategies that better reflect advances in the understanding of the complex relationship between diet and cardiometabolic health.”
Heart-Healthy Eating Recommendations
The Statement recommends including minimally processed plant-based foods and healthy fats and proteins in diets, while limiting foods high in refined starches, added sugars, sodium or unhealthy fats, as well as highly processed foods of poor nutritional quality. Similarly, it calls for prioritizing water and other unsweetened beverages and limiting sugar-sweetened beverages. Alcohol consumption should generally be limited or avoided.
Food Security and Access
Among the other recommendations, the Statement stresses the importance of considering food security across the four domains of availability, affordability, accessibility and utilization of nutritious foods – noting that access to healthy foods, affordability and other social drivers of health significantly affect diet quality. It also underscores how the “translation of nutrition science into clinical practice requires integration of dietary counseling, medical nutrition therapy, Food Is Medicine programs, public policy initiatives, and clinician education.”
GLP-1 Receptor Agonists
The use of GLP-1 receptor agonists is also addressed. According to the Statement, GLP-1s can produce significant weight loss and cardiovascular benefits, but a nutrient-rich, high-quality diet remains important during treatment.
Bottom Line
“Ultimately, heart-healthy eating is not about focusing on a single nutrient or food or following the latest dietary trend,” Hu said. “What matters most is the overall quality of the diet and a consistent pattern of healthy food choices that supports cardiometabolic health and is sustainable over time.”
Clinical Topics:Cardiovascular Care Team,Diabetes and Cardiometabolic Disease,Prevention,Diet
Keywords:Renal Insufficiency, Chronic,Diabetes Mellitus,Kidney,Obesity,Glucagon-Like Peptide-1 Receptor,Metabolic Syndrome,Secondary Prevention,Diet,Diet, Healthy
