Human Services News

From EurekAlert! - Breaking News:

Women who eat a healthy diet, drink moderate amounts of alcohol, are physically active, maintain a healthy weight and do not smoke have a significantly reduced risk of heart attack, according to a report in the October 22 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

"Coronary heart disease is the most important cause of death and disability in women," the authors write as background information in the article.

Agneta Akesson, Ph.D., M.P.H., of the Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, and colleagues identified dietary patterns in 24,444 postmenopausal women by analyzing food frequency questionnaires, on which the women supplied information about how often they ate 96 common foods.

Over an average of 6.2 years of follow-up, 308 women had a new myocardial infarction (heart attack); 51 of these cases were fatal.

"The low-risk diet (high scores for the healthy dietary pattern) characterized by a high intake of vegetables, fruit, whole grains, fish and legumes, in combination with moderate alcohol consumption (5 grams of alcohol per day or less), along with the three low-risk lifestyle behaviors [not smoking, having a waist-hip ratio of less than the 75th percentile and being physically active], was associated with 92 percent decreased risk compared with findings in women without any low-risk diet and lifestyle factors," the authors write.

Several components of fruits, vegetables and whole grains---including fiber, antioxidant vitamins and minerals---have been associated with a reduced risk for coronary heart disease, the researchers note.

"Our study findings indicate that healthy dietary behaviors are present in the population," the authors conclude.

Read more from this post.