COVID-19 and Your Metabolic Health

Cleveland HeartLab COVID-19, diabetes, diet, exercise

You probably already know that people with heart problems, obesity, and diabetes have a higher risk with COVID-19. These conditions increase the chances that you will need to be hospitalized, require a ventilator, and have long-lasting problems because of COVID. Researchers are beginning to understand the links between these diseases and COVID a lot better. They have found that the …

Fermented Foods Can Help Your Health

Cleveland HeartLab blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes, diet

You may have heard the buzz that fermented foods have benefits for your health. Fermented foods include things like yogurt, sauerkraut, and kimchi (a pickled vegetable dish from Korea) and beverages called kefir and kombucha. These products contain “good” bacteria called probiotics. Eating fermented products increases the good bacteria that naturally live in your intestines. This is called the gut …

New Clues to the Diabetes-Dementia Link

Cleveland HeartLab blood pressure, Dementia, diabetes, diet, lifestyle habits

Doctors have known that having type 2 diabetes raises the odds for developing dementia. Now, new research suggests that the age at which your diabetes is diagnosed makes a difference in your risk. The longer you have diabetes, the greater your chances of having problems with thinking skills and memory down the road. That’s worrying because the average age of …

“How Sweet It Is”: Does It Matter to Your Heart this Holiday Season?

Cleveland HeartLab diet, heart attack and stroke

You may know that drinking sugar-sweetened drinks isn’t the wisest health move. Sodas, coffee or tea with sugar, lemonade, sports drinks, and fruit punch aren’t just bad for your waistline. Consuming a lot of these beverages increases your risk for heart attacks and stroke. But you might be surprised to know that diet drinks—those that contain artificial sweeteners—aren’t much better …

Heart Risks and Pregnancy

Cleveland HeartLab blood pressure, diabetes, heart attack and stroke, women's health

More and more, researchers are finding that pregnancy health and related factors in young women are connected to the future heart health of older women.  The latest review of 32 studies is the most powerful evidence yet. It is called an “umbrella study,” because it combines the results of many other review studies. Umbrella studies are considered among the highest …

COVID-19 and You: How to Help Reduce Your Chances of a Bad Case

Cleveland HeartLab blood pressure, COVID-19, diabetes, lifestyle habits

You’ve probably heard that many people who get COVID-19 have light symptoms or no symptoms at all. Others aren’t so lucky. People with certain conditions are at a greater risk for bad problems when COVID-19 strikes. According to the CDC, obesity, diabetes, and high blood pressure increase the chances that a patient will have severe symptoms or need a machine …

Young women, heart attacks and how to prevent them

Cleveland Heartlab blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes, diet, exercise, heart attack and stroke, lifestyle habits, Stroke, women's health

Here’s some good news about heart disease, the number one killer of Americans:  the rate of heart attacks and strokes is dropping and has been for decades. That means you are less likely to develop these problems than in the past. But there’s bad news, too: heart attacks are striking more young people, particularly younger women. New research shows that …

Top Herbs for Your Heart

Cleveland Heartlab blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes, diet, heart attack and stroke, inflammation, Stroke, women's health

A healthy diet is the first step toward a healthier heart. Eating lots of vegetables, fruits, beans, whole grains, healthy fats like olive oil, and lean protein like fish and chicken, can’t be beat for preventing heart attacks and strokes.   But how you prepare these foods also makes a big difference. A variety of herbs have been shown to give …

Pregnancy and Heart Risks

Cleveland Heartlab diabetes, heart attack and stroke

The Surprising Heart Risks of High-Risk Pregnancies Heart disease is usually the last thing on a woman’s mind during pregnancy. But if her pregnancy is high risk, her future heart health may be on the line, accumulating research suggests. Recent studies show that women with high-risk pregnancies or complications, such as gestational diabetes and preeclampsia—a hypertensive condition related to pregnancy—have …

High-Intensity Interval Training and Your Heart

Cleveland Heartlab exercise, heart attack and stroke

A Little Exercise Goes a Long Way for Your Heart Scientists agree: There is little that’s more beneficial to your heart than exercise. But today’s busy schedules can make it hard to establish a regular routine. Fortunately, researchers are finding that it’s not necessary to run marathons or spend long hours on the treadmill to get substantial cardiovascular perks. More …

Yo-Yo Dieting and Cardiovascular Disease

Cleveland Heartlab diet

The Surprising Heart Risks of Yo-Yo Dieting Doctors have long known that repeated weight gain and loss, often called yo-yo dieting or weight cycling, wreaks havoc on metabolism and energy levels. What’s less known is that this pattern may set the stage for cardiovascular disease or worsen existing heart ills. In a surprising new study from New York University School …

Diabetes Drugs that Lower Heart Risks

Cleveland Heartlab diabetes, heart attack and stroke

Of all the complications of diabetes, including blindness, neuropathy (i.e., nerve pain), amputations, and kidney failure, the most dangerous—heart disease—is often paid the least attention. Yet people with diabetes are more than twice as likely to develop heart problems than those without diabetes, and the majority of people with type 2 diabetes will eventually die from cardiovascular ills such as …

A New Eating Peril: The Social-Business Diet

Cleveland Heartlab biomarkers, cholesterol, diabetes, diet, heart attack and stroke, lifestyle habits

When it comes to our eating habits, it doesn’t get much grimmer than the Western diet. High in fat, red and processed meats, salt, and sugar and low in healthful plant foods, it’s the predominant eating pattern in the U.S.—and increasingly in other parts of the world—and solidly linked to heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and other chronic conditions. But recently …

Heart Disease and Menopause: Does the Risk Start Earlier?

Cleveland Heartlab heart attack and stroke, women's health

When it comes to menopause and heart disease risk, timing could be everything. Doctors have long known that women face a greater risk for heart disease after menopause, the cessation of menstrual periods. But reporting in the Journal of the American Heart Association, researchers at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville recently put a new timestamp on the process. The …

The Hidden Disease That Triples Heart Attack Risk

Cleveland Heartlab diabetes, heart attack and stroke, metabolic syndrome

It’s extremely common for people to be diagnosed with diabetes soon after they’ve suffered a heart attack, according to a new study presented at the American Heart Association’s (AHA) 2015 Scientific Sessions. Patients often chalk this double whammy up to bad luck, believing that they were inexplicably hit with two unrelated conditions at once. In reality, having diabetes–particularly if it’s …

Novel Biomarker Test for Cardiovascular Disease Risk Now Available from Cleveland HeartLab

Cleveland Heartlab biomarkers, diabetes, inflammation

A novel biomarker called ADMA/SDMA is an independent predictor of heart attack risk and may also identify patients with diabetes, pre-diabetes or kidney disease, according to recent peer-reviewed studies. The ADMA/SDMA biomarker blood test, now available through Cleveland HeartLab (CHL), measures levels of asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA) and symmetric dimethylarginine (SDMA). Elevated levels of these biomarkers can signal damage to the …

The Vitamin That Fights Inflammation

Cleveland Heartlab cancer, diabetes, inflammation, vitamins and supplements

A new study is the first to show that combining weight loss with an inexpensive vitamin supplement can reduce chronic inflammation more than weight loss alone. Chronic inflammation has been linked to a wide range of disorders, from cardiovascular disease to type 2 diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease, depression, and even cancer. The findings from a randomized clinical trial at Fred Hutchinson …

4 Tasty Anti-Inflammatory Herbs and Spices That Boost Heart Health

Cleveland Heartlab diabetes, diet, heart attack and stroke, inflammation

Used as a natural “medicine” for thousands of years, certain herbs and spices really do have amazing health benefits, including fighting chronic inflammation, which has been linked to a wide range of conditions, from heart disease to diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease, and even cancer, according to new studies. Here’s a look at four delicious seasonings that rank as anti-inflammatory standouts. Curcumin: The …

Dangerous Cluster of Heart Disease & Diabetes Risks Affects 35% of Americans

Cleveland Heartlab diabetes, inflammation, metabolic syndrome

More than one in three US adults have metabolic syndrome, a combination of at least three of five pre-disease-state factors, that doubles risk for heart disease and quintuples the risk for type 2 diabetes, according to a new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.  The study reported that from 2003-2004 to 2011-2012, overall rates of metabolic syndrome …

Telomere Testing May Predict Lifespan and Health Risks

Cleveland Heartlab biomarkers, cancer, diabetes, heart attack and stroke

Telomere Testing May Predict Health Risks Years in Advance The length of telomeres — protective caps at the end of chromosomes often compared to plastic tips on shoelaces — could be an important predictor of increased danger for a range of disorders, from cancer to cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes. What’s more, telomere testing may identify patients at risk …

5 Ways to Tell If You Have Chronic Inflammation

Cleveland Heartlab diabetes, diet, exercise, inflammation, lifestyle habits

Cardiovascular disease (CVD), diabetes and cancer have shared risk factors, including systemic inflammation, University of Colorado Cancer Center investigator Tim Byers, MD, MPH reported at the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2015. For example, says Dr. Byers, “Obesity leads to a chronic inflammatory state and circulating growth factors that have adverse effects on the heart, and can also …

4 Surprising Causes of High Blood Pressure

Cleveland Heartlab blood pressure, diabetes, vitamins and supplements

About 70 million Americans–one in three adults–have high blood pressure, but only about half of them have it under control.  That’s alarming since a new study by the CDC reports that U.S. deaths related to hypertension (HTN) have soared by 61.8 percent, from 245,220 in 2000 to 396,675 in 2013. The researchers examined files from the National Vital Statistics System …

How Effective Are Anti-Inflammatory Diets for Lowering Heart Attack Risk?

Cleveland Heartlab biomarkers, diabetes, diet, heart attack and stroke, inflammation

In advice that many American have taken to heart, Hippocrates wrote, “Let food be thy medicine.” In fact, diets to reduce chronic inflammation–which is linked to disorders ranging from heart attacks and strokes to type 2 diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease and even cancer–have become a health craze. However, there’s debate about which eating plan–and foods–offers the greatest cardiovascular and anti-inflammatory benefits. …

6 Surprising Ways Chronic Inflammation Affects Health

Cleveland Heartlab diabetes, heart attack and stroke, inflammation

In a medical version of the “unified field” theory in physics, many scientists now believe that most—or perhaps all—chronic diseases may have the same trigger: inflammation. Studies have linked this fiery process to a wide range of disorders, from heart attacks and strokes to type 2 diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease, chronic pain, and even cancer. Here is a look at six …

6 Ways Women May Reduce Their Heart Disease Risk by 92%

Cleveland Heartlab diabetes, diet, exercise, heart attack and stroke, lifestyle habits

Following six healthy lifestyle habits may reduce women’s risk for heart disease by 92 percent, compared to women with none of these habits, a new study published in Journal of American College of Cardiology suggests. Researchers from Harvard and other centers tracked 88,940 women whose ages were 27 to 44 at baseline over a 20-year period. With February marking American …