Nutrition plays a key role in prevention of cardiovascular disease, the leading cause of death worldwide. Diet influences a broad spectrum of cardiometabolic risk factors, notably a cluster including excess adiposity, dyslipidemia, impaired glucose metabolism and high blood pressure. In the face of the rapidly increasing incidence of obesity and diabetes, maintaining cardiometabolic health through adoption of a healthy lifestyle is a top public health priority. In this book, Nutrition and Cardiometabolic Health, international experts present state-of-the-art scholarly reviews of dietary and lifestyle effects on metabolic systems associated with cardiovascular health and disease. It covers a broad range of topics including biological and behavioral processes regulating food intake; lifestyle and surgical approaches to weight loss; nutritional considerations for optimal cardiometabolic health across the lifespan; the relationship of macronutrients, whole foods and dietary patterns to diabetes and cardiovascular disease; and diet as a modulator of gene expression, epigenetics and the gut microbiome and the relationship of these traits to disorders of metabolism. This book provides its readers with an authoritative view of the present state of knowledge of dietary effects on cardiometabolic health and will be of interest to nutrition and healthcare professionals alike.

Cardiovascular, respiratory, and related conditions cause more than 40 percent of all deaths globally, and their substantial burden is rising, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Their burden extends well beyond health effects to include significant economic and societal consequences. Most of these conditions are related, share risk factors, and have common control measures at the clinical, population, and policy levels. Lives can be extended and improved when these diseases are prevented, detected, and managed. This volume summarizes current knowledge and presents evidence-based interventions that are effective, cost-effective, and scalable in LMICs.

Cereal and pulse crops are staple foods that provide essential nutrients to many populations of the world. Traditionally, whole grains were consumed but most current foods are derived from refined fractions of cereal and pulse crops. Consumption of processed or refined products may reduce the health benefits of food. In wheat-based processed foods, for example, the removed 40% of the grain (mainly the bran and the germ of the wheat grain) contains the majority of the health beneficial components. These components, particularly non-essential phytochemicals such as carotenoids, polyphenols, phytosterols/ stanols, and dietary fibers, have been shown to reduce the risk of major chronic diseases of humans, such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and Parkinson’s disease. Such bioactives are therefore good candidates for ingredients of nutraceuticals and functional foods. There are many factors that can affect the bioactive content of cereal and pulse-based food ingredients, including genetics, growing and storage conditions, post-harvest treatments, food formulation and processing. All of these factors ultimately affect human health and wellness. Bioavailability is also important for these compounds for exerting their protective roles. Cereals and Pulses: Nutraceutical Properties and Health Benefits provides a summary of current research findings related to phytochemical composition and properties of cereal and pulse crops. The nutraceutical properties of each major cereal and pulse are discussed. Coverage of cereals and pulse crops includes barley, oats, rice, rye, corn, adlay, wheat, buckwheat, psyllium, sorghum, millet, common beans, field peas, faba beans, chickpea, lentil and soybeans. Chapters for each crop discuss methods to improve crop utilization, nutraceutical components and properties, bioactive compositions, antioxidant properties, beneficial health effects, disease prevention activities, and areas for future research. Also included are two chapters that examine the beneficial health properties of dietary fibers and antioxidants. Edited and written by an international team of respected researchers, this book is a reference guide for scientists working in food ingredients, food product research and development, functional foods and nutraceuticals, crop breeding and genetics, human nutrition, post-harvest treatment and processing of cereal grains and pulses. It will enable them to effect value-added food innovation for health promotion and disease risk reduction.

This book discusses all aspects of non-pharmacologic approaches to primary and secondary CVD prevention. It highlights the strength of evidence for particular diet styles in CVD prevention, including plant-based diets, the Mediterranean diet, the DASH diet, and low-carbohydrate diets. Chapters present evidence and future directions for diet and nutrition in diseases related to CVD, such as dyslipidemia, cardiometabolic disease (pre-diabetes, the metabolic syndrome, type-2 diabetes mellitus), and obesity. Finally, the book reviews novel and emerging aspects of dietary intervention in CVD prevention, such as dietary approaches to inflammation and the role of the microbiome in CVD. Up-to-date, evidence-based, and clinically oriented, Prevention and Treatment of Cardiovascular Disease: Nutritional and Dietary Approaches is an essential resource for physicians, residents, fellows, and medical students in cardiology, clinical nutrition, family medicine, endocrinology, and lipidology.

This book is a printed edition of the Special Issue "Nutrition and Chronic Conditions" that was published in Nutrients

Malnutrition and obesity are both common among Americans over age 65. There are also a host of other medical conditions from which older people and other Medicare beneficiaries suffer that could be improved with appropriate nutritional intervention. Despite that, access to a nutrition professional is very limited. Do nutrition services benefit older people in terms of morbidity, mortality, or quality of life? Which health professionals are best qualified to provide such services? What would be the cost to Medicare of such services? Would the cost be offset by reduced illness in this population? This book addresses these questions, provides recommendations for nutrition services for the elderly, and considers how the coverage policy should be approached and practiced. The book discusses the role of nutrition therapy in the management of a number of diseases. It also examines what the elderly receive in the way of nutrition services along the continuum of care settings and addresses the areas of expertise needed by health professionals to provide appropriate nutrition services and therapy.

One major example of the synergy of bioactive foods and extracts is their role as an antioxidant and the related remediation of cardiovascular disease. There is compelling evidence to suggest that oxidative stress is implicated in the physiology of several major cardiovascular diseases including heart failure and increased free radical formation and reduced antioxidant defences. Studies indicate bioactive foods reduce the incidence of these conditions, suggestive of a potential cardioprotective role of antioxidant nutrients. Bioactive Food as Dietary Interventions for Cardiovascular Disease investigates the role of foods, herbs and novel extracts in moderating the pathology leading to cardiovascular disease. It reviews existing literature, and presents new hypotheses and conclusions on the effects of different bioactive components of the diet. Addresses the most positive results from dietary interventions using bioactive foods to impact cardiovascular disease Documents foods that can affect metabolic syndrome and other related conditions Convenient, efficient and effective source that allows readers to identify potential uses of compounds - or indicate those compounds whose use may be of little or no health benefit Associated information can be used to understand other diseases that share common etiological pathways

"In this compilation, the pathogenesis and interrelationships of metabolic abnormalities are discussed, particularly their impact on cardiovascular disease, as well as the role of excess adiposity in metabolic derange. The authors discuss the literature on polycystic ovary syndrome and cardio-metabolic risk factors, providing recommendations that would be helpful for healthcare providers and policy makers. Additionally, the aspects of nutritional habits associated to an increase in cardiovascular risk factors in the obese population are addressed"--

Ever since the publication of Ancel Keys’ watershed ‘Seven Countries Study’ in 1970, medical thinking has posited a causal link between the intake of animal fats and coronary heart disease. The research of Prof. Harumi Okuyama and his colleagues presented in this new publication suggests that this link is in fact tenuous. It goes beyond that to suggest that current medical wisdom regarding lipid nutrition may actually be counterproductive. This ground-breaking analysis is likely to be debated for many years to come. The ‘Seven Countries Study’, which identified the specifics of the Mediterranean Diet and awarded it a central position in combating coronary heart disease, triggered significant changes in Western diets. Most notably, it stimulated a widespread attempt to reduce animal fats and replace them with vegetable fats. The low-density lipoprotein (LDL) element of the cholesterol naturally present in animal-source foods was dubbed a killer, and a significant industry developed around the provision of plant-based oils and fats. The clinical consensus on cholesterol was further strengthened in 1987 by the introduction of statins, an innovative class of drugs that reduce LDL production in the liver and are designed to help guard against coronary heart disease. Thirteen Nobel Prizes have been awarded to scientists who devoted major parts of their careers to cholesterol research. It is therefore a brave research team that dares to challenge the link between animal fats and coronary heart disease. This, however, is precisely what Prof. Okuyama and his team set out to do in this book. They actually recommend increasing the intake of cholesterol and animal fats, to an extent that does not lead to obesity. This recommendation is based on the discovery by Prof. Okuyama and his team that common vegetable oils such as canola and hydrogenated vegetable fats have toxic effects. They demonstrate that hydrogenated vegetable fats and oils are important culprits in atherosclerosis and other lifestyle diseases, and suggest that high total or LDL-cholesterol is not the cause of atherosclerosis or cardiovascular disease. Further, they argue that current medical guidelines on lipid nutrition conflict with evidence-based research, and that persistently focusing on LDL-cholesterol as the cause of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) is counterproductive. Key findings Some types of vegetable fats and oils exhibit stroke-inducing and endocrine-disrupting activity. Their inhibition of the vitamin K2–osteocalcin link is the major cause of ASCVD and related diseases. In the current food environment, the balance of omega-6 and omega-3 fatty acids is too much in favour of omega-6, and therefore lowering the omega-6/omega-3 ratio is recommended for the prevention of allergic and inflammatory diseases including ASCVD and cancer. Atherogenesis can develop without elevated LDL-cholesterol levels and/or in association with decreasing LDL-cholesterol levels. Increased intake of vegetable fats and oils with stroke-inducing and endocrine-disrupting activities in countries with restricted intakes of animal fats and cholesterol has led to the critical situations surrounding physical and mental health currently seen in Japan, East Asia, and the Mediterranean countries. Medical care professionals continue to insist on actively reducing LDL-cholesterol levels. This approach will only heighten the extensive health problems that Japan and some countries are at present facing. Many aspects of current medical practice in Japan are indeed likely to be in conflict with that country’s Medical Care Act. This thought-provoking analysis of one of the major health syndromes of our day demands serious consideration by professionals interested in cardiovascular health in particular and in public health more widely. Its implications are far-reaching – for medical practitioners, medical insurers, nutritionists, food producers and pharmaceutical manufacturers alike, as well as for individual patients.