Yes, You Can Prevent & Reverse Heart Disease - But Are You Up For The Challenge? Let Dr. Esselstyn Convince You - Part I

"I Don't Understand Why Asking People to Eat a Well-Balanced Vegetarian Diet is Considered Drastic, While It Is Medically Conservative To Cut People Open"     -Dr. Dean Ornish-

 

UPDATE to this post:

What I Learned From Dr. Caldwell and Ann Esselstyn's Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease "School"

Fifteen Months Into the Esselstyn-Style Plant-Based No-Oil Way of Eating - The Healthy Librarian Spills the Beans - And It's All Good! Can't Wait to Compare Notes with Bill Clinton on Saturday.

Additional HHLL posts about Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr.'s Heart Disease Prevention & Reversal Diet

I've known about Dr. Esselstyn's work for years.  And Nathan Pritikin's and Dr. Dean Ornish's.  But it never applied to me!  I don't have heart disease! Of course I'd follow their plans if I was sick, but I'm not.

Wrong!  Most of us have some stage of heart disease if we're eating the usual Western Diet, and that includes the so-called healthy Mediterranean Diet & the American Heart Association's Prudent Diet.

Autopsies performed on 20 year old American GIs  during the Korean & Vietnam wars; & on accident, homicide & suicide victims aged 18-35 have consistently shown over 80% already had atherosclerotic plaque in their coronary arteries.

And atherosclerosis doesn't limit itself to the coronary arteries.  If it's in your heart, it's in your brain.  And seeing both my parents "survive" strokes, I'll take a heart attack over a stroke any day!

I had the chance to hear Dr. Esselstyn on WCPN's Sound of Ideas last Wednesday and the light bulb finally came on for me.  Now I understand exactly why the Mediterranean Diet that I thought was so good, isn't.  Olive oil-- forget about it!

Now I finally understand how we can have a heart attack or a silent stroke even if we think we don't have heart disease or atherosclerosis.  Your coronary artery has to be 70% occluded to have symptoms, like angina. If your arteries are even 10-69% blocked, and you're inflaming them with what you eat, you're at risk.  It's all about inflammation - Calm down the inflammation & you'll keep those atherosclerotic plaques safely stuck to your artery walls.

Tim Russert never had chest pain (angina).  He was on all the right medicines. Statins & high blood pressure meds.  Even if he had had an angioplasty or bypass surgery that wouldn't have arrested his disease. That's just a patch job.  It doesn't do anything to stop heart disease.  You can't insert stents or bypasses in every blood vessel in your body.

 

Who is Dr. Esselstyn & Why Should I Listen to What He Says?

• Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn was a surgeon, clinician & researcher at the Cleveland Clinic. He's presently Emeritus staff and privately sees patients from all over the country who want to take an active role in reversing their heart disease.   He's a passionate out-spoken advocate for following the vegan diet to prevent, stop & reverse heart disease.  He and his wife started following this diet 25 years ago, when  he was 50 years old.  At age 75, he's a walking testament to the diet he advocates!
• Back in 1984-85 he started a group of 24 patients with severe  heart disease (5 of whom were told they had less than a year to live) on a strict vegan, no oil diet.  6 dropped out--2 of that group died--the other 4 all had bypass surgery.  Of the remaining group who continued on the diet, all have  stopped or reversed their heart disease for over 20 years now.  All have active full lives. Here' s an example of the kind of disease reversal Dr. Essestyn's patients achieved after 32 months on a vegan diet.

                             

Photo:  Coronary angiograms of the distal left anterior descending artery before (left bracket 11/27/96) and after (right bracket 7/22/99) 32 months of a plant-based diet without cholesterol-lowering medications, showing profound improvement.

How Do You Prevent, Stop & Reverse Heart Disease?

Here it is, straight & simple.  You won't like this.  You won't think it applies to you.  And you probably already know it anyway.  At least that's how I looked at that. 

Meat, cheese, milk, butter, ice cream, eggs, fried foods, oils and margarine are the lethal atherosclerotic lynchpins.

• No chicken, no fish, no meat, no eggs
• No oils of any kind - including olive oil
• No dairy products of any kind - even fat-free
• Generally no nuts or avocados (small amounts of walnuts are OK if you don't have diagnosed heart disease-but watch out-it's hard to control the amount)

What Can You Eat?

• Vegetables-lots of greeny leafy ones to restore & heal the endothelial lining of your blood vessels.  Kale, Swiss Chard, Cilantro, Collards, Bok Choy, Parsley, Spinach, Broccoli, Brussel Sprouts, Cauliflower
• Whole fruit
• Whole grains
• Beans/Legumes; "light" tofu--cautious use of low-fat soy meat substitutes. Many are highly processed, high-fat junk food.

How Long Will It Take to Make Myself Heart-Attack Proof?

It's hard to believe, but according to Dr. Esselstyn, if you change your diet, you will change your biochemistry & metabolism & make yourself heart-attack proof in 3-4 weeks.  Angina will stop in that short amount of time.  Of course, it will take much longer to reverse the plaque build-up, but within a short amount of time you can prevent plaque from rupturing and causing a heart attack.

How Can a Symptom-Free Person With Arterial Blockage of Only 10-30% Possibly Have a Heart Attack?

• Arterial plaque is like little bubbles of inflammation.  The Western diet of meat, dairy & fat keeps that inflammation going and the plaque growing.
• Even if the artery blockage is 30% or less, when the inflammation gets to the point that the protective cap covering the plaque starts to thin out, eventually the shear force of the blood running over the plaque can cause the plaque to tear away from the artery's lining. Think of plaque like a scab in the artery lining that comes loose.
• When the plaque ruptures, its contents ooze out, spilling into the blood.
• The ruptured plaque stimulates the formation of a clot which can now cause the artery's blockage to go from the previous safe 10-30% to 100%.
• Bingo!  A heart attack occurs in someone who never had a previous symptom, who never even knew he had heart disease, and certainly never had a reason to have an angiogram.
• Inflammation in the presence of plaque is bad news.

But, according to Dr. Esselstyn, if you change what you eat you will never rupture your plaque and never have a heart attack.  People have the capacity to make themselves heart attack proof--not the cardiologist--not the heart surgeon--they, themselves--providing they make these profound changes.

Check-out Dr. Esselstyn's website.

Listen to WCPN's broadcast.

 

Comments

[jeffrey dach md]

Two beloved American celebrities have succumbed to heart disease before their time. The national response has been disappointment in a medical system that could allow this to happen. What could have been done differently to save the lives of both Tim and George, to avoid this fatal outcome?

For more....
Saving Tim Russert and George Carlin by Jeffrey Dach MD

http://jeffreydach.com/2008/06/26/saving-tim-russert-and-george-carlin-by-jeffrey-dach-md.aspx

Jeffrey Dach MD
4700 Sheridan Suite T
Hollywood FL 33021
http://www.drdach.com

[Lemonchiffon]

I've been on Dr. Esselstyn's plan for almost 3 months. My angina stopped after about a month but it came back yesterday and today. The only fat I've had lately is from the flax seed and I'm not even having the recommended tablespoon per day, I am only using 1-2 teaspoons a day. I'm stopping the flax as I don't know what else to do. I am a veteran and do not really feel like going to the VA hospital and trusting a resident m.d. with my heart. I just hope this angina stops soon!

[Benjamin Britton]

I'm a 30 year old male. I have a childhood history of supraventricular tachycardia and have a HORRIBLE family history... both grandfathers, two uncles died of heart attacks, one first cousin just has a massive heart attack. So I decided to give it a try.
February 2009. Height 5'9", weight, 195, Total Choleserol: 210, LDL 186.
July 2009: Weight 169, Total Cholesterol: 120, LDL 86.
My wife, a nurse practitioner, is amazed... as am I... as is my family physician. I may yet get to see my two young daughters grow up. Thank you Dr. Esselstyn.

[Abdul Waheed]

This is an eye opener write up. It must have saved many lives. This work should be televised, read over radio programmes again and again. It is highly beneficial to all who have or do not have heart, brain or erectile dysfunction problems.

[Jean Eisele]

Do you recommend drinking whey or soy protein powder and fruit mixtures to increase the protein in the diet?

[Elwoode]

I listened to the radio interview. He did not explain why milk is bad for your heart. If you take out the fat (fully skimmed) you are left with protien, vitamins and calcium. He dis say in fact milk consumption had a negative effect on calcium but you could take calcium pills.
Also he does not say why in some of these 3rd world cultures where they have little or no heart disease it is ok for them to consume fish and meat but not us. Is it the amount? but he says NO meat or fish not Little meat or fish.

[rajan]

In case of a established heart patient, Following the Esselstyn advice, is the conventional medicine (Statin, Blood thinner, etc) required for a stable patient?