Heart Health Archive

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Research we're watching

Many people know what they need to do to keep their hearts healthy. The challenge is making changes (like exercising regularly and eating more fruits and vegetables) and sticking with them. New research suggests monthly meetings with a group of peers who offer support and encouragement can help.

The study included 543 adults with at least one risk factor for heart disease (being overweight, smoking, being physically inactive, or having high blood pressure). Half were randomly assigned to a self-management control group. The others were placed in teams of 10 for the peer-group interventions. Two peer-elected trained leaders headed each group meeting, which involved role-play, brainstorming, and activities to address emotions, diet, and exercise. The groups met for 60 to 90 minutes monthly for one year.

Coffee is nearly a national obsession in the United States. For years, experts have debated whether drinking coffee is good for you. Recently published research suggests that regular, moderate coffee consumption is associated with a lower risk of overall mortality, and that heavy consumption of coffee isn’t linked with a greater risk of death.

Many people practice meditation in hopes of staving off stress and its related health problems, including heart disease. While some studies of meditation haven't been the most scientifically rigorous, other research strongly suggests that this ancient, mind-calming practice can actually help lower blood pressure — and that it may offer other benefits for the entire cardiovascular system.

"The evidence that chronic stress is pretty toxic for the cardiovascular system is mounting," says Dr. Laura Kubzansky, a professor of social and behavior science at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

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You get the most bang for your buck from keeping blood pressure in the normal range, but don't skip the other things.

Many tasks are required to run a household. There are groceries to shop for, broken things to fix, and windows to wash. But you need to prioritize: it makes no sense to worry about the weeds in the garden if the mortgage payment is overdue.

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Research we're watching

A long-term study from researchers at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine has found that men's hearts typically grow with age, while women's shrink. The researchers used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to study the left ventricle—the main pumping chamber of the heart—in around 3,000 men and women who were enrolled in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis. All of the participants—who ranged in age from 54 to 94—were free of cardiovascular disease when they entered the study. They had heart scans at the start and 10 years later.

Comparing the MRI scans of men and women, the researchers found that both had declines in left ventricular volume (the amount of blood the chamber holds) over the decade. However, the mass of the ventricle itself increased in men, while it decreased slightly in women. And having a bigger heart seemed to be a disadvantage. It was associated with higher blood pressure and body mass index and lower levels of HDL (good) cholesterol. The study was published online October 20, 2015, by the journal Radiology.

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News briefs

Here's another reason to take sweetened drinks out of your diet: a study published online Nov. 2, 2015, by the journal Heart suggests that drinking sweetened beverages each day is linked to an increased risk for heart failure in men. Heart failure is a gradual decline in the heart's ability to pump enough blood to meet the body's needs. Researchers tracked the dietary information of 42,000 middle-aged or older men in Sweden from 1998 to 2010. They made no distinction between types of drinks or how they were sweetened, whether it was with sugar, fructose, or artificial sweetener. However, coffee, tea, and fruit juice were not included in the study. After excluding potentially influential factors, researchers noted that men who drank at least two daily servings of sweetened drinks had a 23% heightened risk of developing heart failure compared with men who didn't drink sweetened beverages. The study didn't prove that sweetened drinks caused heart failure. In fact, the researchers pointed out that drinking a lot of sweetened beverages is usually an indication of a poor diet, which is a risk factor for heart failure in itself. But they also noted that sweetened drinks are associated with obesity and type 2 diabetes, which are risk factors for heart failure, too. Best advice: avoid sweetened beverages or at least limit them to occasional consumption.

These innovative devices and procedures for diagnosing and treating heart conditions are on the horizon.

For the most part, the Harvard Heart Letter focuses on treatments that are already available for people with heart disease. In this article, we're making an exception. Editor in Chief Dr. Deepak L. Bhatt selected five innovative technologies in the world of cardiovascular health that he predicts we'll be hearing more about in the coming years.

Ask the doctor

Q I have a relative who had a total cholesterol value of 155, yet he still had a heart attack with 90% blockage in one artery. How could that happen?

A I understand your confusion, considering how doctors have long focused on the importance of having an optimal total cholesterol level (less than 200 milligrams per deciliter or mg/dL) as a way to lower the chance of having a heart attack. It's actually the harmful LDL cholesterol value that's most important in terms of this risk. However, a person with a total cholesterol level of 155 mg/dL probably has an LDL level under 100 mg/dL, which is currently considered a reasonable target for avoiding heart disease.