Obesity is Tied to Heart Failure

A post by Blanche Scharf http://www.yourhealthupdates.com I have been studying natural healing modalities for the last 25 years. In that time I have had the privilege of working with some of the greatest minds in Natural Healing including Naturopaths, Scientists, and Energy Healers. I have seen people miraculously heal from all kinds of dis-ease thru non-invasive methods. Personally, I have experienced all kinds of diets from Macrobiotics to Raw Foods. Now is a very important time to start sharing this health information with as many people as possible, so people can make well informed decisions about their health and not fall victim to a sickcare system based on profit, rather than one of supporting wholeness, compassion and love To see more posts by Blanche Scharf, click here

Obesity is tied to heart failure. Specialists at Johns Hopkins and elsewhere report evidence linking severe overweight to prolonged inflammation of heart tissue and the subsequent damage that lead to failure of the body’s blood-pumping organ. The latest findings from the Multi-ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (Mesa) to be published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, says the estimated 72 million obese Americans should be concerned over these findings.

The biological effects of obesity on the heart were found to be profound said senior investigator Joao Lima, M.D. Even if obese people feel healthy there are measurable chemical signs of damage to their heart, which go beyond diabetes and high blood pressure. Researchers conducted the tests, and tracked the development of heart failure in an ethnically diverse group of about 7,000 men and women, ages 45 to 84, which were enrolled in the MESA study.

The researchers from five universities across the United States also found alarming links between inflammation and metabolic syndrome. This condition produces the risk factors for heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, elevated blood glucose levels, excess abdominal fat, abnormal cholesterol levels, and obesity. This also doubles a person’s chances of developing heart failure.

Again it is inflammation chemicals in the obese participants that seemed to be a key predictor of heart failure. A tripling of average levels of C-reactive protein in study participants increased the chance of heart failure by 36 percent. One-fifth higher than average blood levels of fibrinogen, best known for its role in blood clotting, but also a major player in muscle scarring, upped the risk of heart failure by 37 percent.

 “What this tells us is that both obesity and the inflammatory markers are closely tied to each other and to heart failure,” says lead researcher Hossein Bahrami, M.D., M.P.H

Bahrami, a senior cardiology research fellow at Hopkins, says “the basic evidence is building the case that inflammation may be the chemical route by which obesity targets the heart, and that inflammation may play an important role in the increased risk of heart failure in obese people, especially those with the metabolic syndrome.”

He also notes that previous studies, done at Hopkins, show that even moderate exercise to lose abdominal fat dramatically offsets the harmful effects of metabolic syndrome on heart function.

Obesity is tied to heart failure. However, we may not need all these studies telling us that. All we need to know is that we can’t be obese and remain healthy. Concise information is informative, but is it a powerful enough tool to reverse the trend. What we allocate to these studies may not give us the currency to specifically reduce the incident of heart failure, or any other chronic condition.

The reason is heart failure is a nutrient deficiency as are many of the chronic conditions. Americans for the most part are overfed and under nourished. Without an optimal diet to operate on, all the studies in the world are not going to be as helpful as we would like. Being obese is of course a burden on any individual as it leads also to being out of condition. A connection to obesity and any number of diseases is easy to make.

What are needed are the tools that specifically help with the nutritional solutions, and lower the risk of inflammation. We eat a diet that causes inflammation throughout the body. Our Omega 6 intake is too high, and does not come from healthy sources. The ratio of omega 3 to 6 should be anywhere from 1:3 and is currently as high as 1:25. Omega 3 fatty acids works as an anti-inflammatory. This information is not acknowledged in media reports. We need to know more than obesity is tied to heart failure.

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